The End
by Singofsolace
Summary: In the end, they both have marks. Chapter 29: Addiction. Tenzin is no fool. He knows he's hooked the first time he kisses her.
1. Tattoos

Tattoos

In the end, they both have marks.

Lin wears hers proudly; battle scars, strikingly apparent against her skin just days after her eighteenth birthday, mark her as a warrior.

Tenzin, skin raw and inflamed from the ministrations of his father's needle, needs a bit more time to become accustomed to the arrow stretching its length up his back and over his bald head. He wears them humbly, honored to be the first boy in over a hundred years to sport the blue ink of his ancestors. They mark him as a master.

When Lin saw his tattoos for the first time, she ran to him, and he lifted her up into his arms, the air around them circling and undulating. He had been gone for a year, traveling with his father, and he had missed her dearly.

When Tenzin visited Lin late in the evening after the altercation that had left her scarred, he was turned away by his mother, but not before he caught a glimpse of her laying on one of the guest beds, the red flesh of her cheek raised and uneven, in stark contrast to the smooth skin of the rest of her face. She had looked so frail, so alone, lying there in an empty room under white sheets, her body so small without her new metalbending uniform that she had taken to wearing even on the rare occasions when she was not working. He had gone out to the pavilion where his father had taken him every morning to meditate since he was a toddler, and prayed for dawn.

Though Lin never paid any notice to her scars, and Tenzin eventually grew accustomed to his tattoos, there was a bond formed between the two. A bond born of skin marred and pain withstood. A bond of the strong, of the enduring.

In the end, they both have marks.

But the tattoos, the burden of Aang's legacy, eventually tear the two apart.


	2. Family

Once, when Lin was very young, she had been assigned the task of drawing a family portrait. At first, Lin did not understand. She went up to her teacher shyly, unsure what a family portrait was supposed to look like. Her teacher, whose gray hair lay in curls about her face, gazed at her over the rims of her wire spectacles.

"Just draw the members of your family," the old woman explained, failing to keep her exasperation completely out of her tone. She had gone into the teaching profession with a great deal of patience for silly questions, but as she had aged, she found her tolerance for the hundreds of inane, childish queries she received to be waning.

When Lin did not move away from her desk, the teacher, whose name was Ms. Wells, felt curiosity replacing the slight irritation that had preceded it. "You do know what a family is, don't you?"

Trembling under the burden of her teacher's piercing gaze, Lin could not find her voice.

"Miss Bei Fong."

Silence.

Shuffling her feet, Lin was eventually granted the ability to speak.

"Yes," she squeaked, "I know a family is the people that you love."

Ms. Wells seemed to consider this for a moment before amending the girl's definition.

"In some cases, yes, but with regard to a family _portrait_, your family is made up of those who are immediately related to you, as in your mother, father, and siblings. Some would extend the list to your grandparents, but that is a personal choice. Do you have grandparents, Lin?"

Nodding her head slowly, Lin gave a small, "Yes."

"Can you draw them for me?"

"No."

Once more, silence stretched between them, as Lin seemed to want to shrink into the floor.

"And why not?" there was a warning note in Ms. Wells' voice, as though Lin had better start cooperating, for her own sake.

"I don't know what they look like."

It was true; she had never met her grandparents, and her mother, being blind, could not describe their appearances. She had never seen any pictures of them, as Toph, of course, had no use for photos.

"No matter." Ms. Wells took a deep, calming breath. "Your parents, then. Surely you know what they look like?"

Lin's eyes fell to her feet. Gathering her strength, she spoke quickly, as if afraid she would never say what she needed to say if she had the time to think it through. "I wanted to draw my mother, but you said in the directions that we we're supposed to draw the people who take care of us…so I was wondering, Ms. Wells, if I could draw my Aunt and Uncles too, even though they aren't related to me."

The girl's voice was hopeful, her words rushed towards the end. Finally, Ms. Wells understood her student's dilemma, and felt a bit foolish for having not realized it sooner. She recognized her own lack of sensitivity towards the subject, having forgotten that the famous Toph Bei Fong was a single parent with only one child.

"Of course, Miss Bei Fong. Draw whomever you like."

Smiling widely, Lin returned to her desk with excitement. She was going to draw everyone; Aunt Katara and Uncle Aang, Kya, Bumi, and Tenzin, Uncle Sokka, and her mother. When she was done, she had more people in her picture than any of her classmates, but she hardly paid any notice to the strange looks she received. This was her family, after all, and though they shared no ancestors, she knew they were just as close as any other family.

Toph, of course, could not see the picture, but Lin delighted in describing what she had drawn. And the next time they visited Air Temple Island, Lin was sure to bring her drawing along. When she showed the family portrait to her aunt and uncle, there were tears in Katara's eyes for the rest of the evening. Sitting around the dinner table that night, Lin knew that what she told Ms. Wells was true: a family is made up of the people that you love.

And, she thought as her mother beamed at her from across the table, it was made up of the people who love _you_.


	3. Love

Prompt: Love

All Tenzin ever wanted was love. True love.

When he found it, he swore he would never let it go. He would keep it held safely against his chest, wings clipped, so it would not fly away. He whispered promises of forever, knowing he would never leave his love alone.

But he did.

He can list hundreds of reasons why it could not work, why it was better to end it, move on, be with someone else who had similar wants and needs. Why, when all was said and done, he did not marry the girl he had dreamed of marrying since he was ten years old. Why, when he sees his children running around the island, he does not question the choices he made. He knew what he _really_ wanted (a _family_), and now he has it. It is as simple as that.

Or so he tells himself.

Still, there are days when he wonders. When doubts linger. When he sees the scowl on his first love's face and longs to make her smile. When he realizes, with a start, that she has never been with anyone besides him, even though it has been fourteen years since their relationship ended. When he cannot help but wonder…

Does she still love him?

But with that thought comes a host of others that he will never allow himself to examine. The thoughts are persistent, unyielding, like the subject herself, but he refuses to acknowledge them. (Most of the time).

Because the one thought that cannot be ignored is blasphemous, given his life's events. He has a wife, a family, a career, a _legacy_ to uphold, all of which rely on his honor being preserved. He cannot afford to entertain the one, incorrigible notion that threatens to strip him of all decency.

(Does he still love _her_?)

The thought always comes when he least expects it. When he is gathering his children into the pavilion for morning meditation. When he is sitting in a council meeting, surrounded by irate, stubborn faces. When the sun rises (or sets) and he can still feel the warmth of their first kiss on the shores of Yue Bay, while the sun sank lower and lower into the sea.

At the end of the day, when he lays beside his wife and listens to her gentle breathing, he feels incredibly unclean and undeserving of her unwavering loyalty. She has never loved another, never known the feel of another's touch. He is her first and only love, and it makes him both joyously happy and unbelievably sick, for he cannot say the same. He still remembers the butterfly kisses on his jaw, the light pressure of _her _lips against his forehead. He calls Lin_ her_ even in his thoughts, if only to put some distance between them. But it is an unnecessary measure, for the divide has never been greater, never been this impossibly wide.

There is water between them, in the gap, filling the emptiness with danger. The sea churns, gathers strength, roils and thrashes as though it is tortured by a perpetual storm. He wants to build a bridge, but he hasn't the necessary supplies.

Lin had always loathed the sea.

So the distance remains, the wounds on either side unable to be healed. There is nothing to be done, nothing that can be said that will fix what has been broken. The pieces lay scattered around the city, around the island, and he has hidden the ones that he has found inside his heart, where she cannot get them. His heart belongs to someone else.

Tenzin knew, from the age of ten, that all he ever wanted was love. True, everlasting love.

And when dusk falls, when dawn arrives, when the sun reaches its zenith, when the moon hangs full and heavy over a sleepy city, Tenzin is awake and wondering…

...is there such a thing as everlasting love?


	4. Duty

Lin knows what "duty" means before she knows the definitions of much more elusive terms, such as "sacrifice" and "obligation." She knows that duty is late nights and early mornings spent sitting by the door, waiting to be sure that her mother made it home just one more time. Duty is the darkness that pools itself beneath her mother's sightless eyes, the bags that have no right to make her look as though she hasn't slept since before the war. Duty is never knowing if the police caught the bad guy, but praying that even if they didn't, she would not lose her only parent to the cause of catching him. Duty was joining the police academy at sixteen, graduating at eighteen, and becoming the Chief of Police at twenty-two. Duty was giving up your own safety to preserve the lives of your neighbors, friends, and family.

Duty was a scary, scary word, and Lin never grew to like it, because once out of childhood, duty kept her away from the one thing more important to her than her responsibility to Republic City: Tenzin.

Tenzin had always hated "obligations," as his father called them. They involved getting up at the crack of dawn to meditate, feeding the flying bison thrice daily, making his bed, cleaning his room, helping to set the table. Obligations ate into his free time, into his leisure, and he hardly had any time for playing as it was. Obligations made his back ache with the strain of keeping it completely straight as he meditated. They made his fingertips shrivel up from washing the dishes in the sink. They made him hold his breath as he cleaned the excrement out of the bison's caves. They made him miss his father on the nights when council meetings ran late.

Obligations were terrible, terrible things, and he did not warm up to them, especially when they started to tear away at his relationship with his childhood friend, Lin.

One had a duty to the city, to what her mother had left behind.

The other had a duty to his heritage, to what would never come again if he did not produce it himself.

Duty defined the lines in the sand that neither could cross. And cross them they did, for better or worse.

Duty, after all, was just a scary word. And scary words can't hurt you if, for just a moment, you forget what they mean.


	5. Memories

A/N: I do not own Legend of Korra

Prompt: Memories

Lin should know better by now; she's certainly been alive long enough to come away with some wisdom as to how cruelly the mind works. She should know that the more she tries to force herself to forget, the better she remembers.

Her memory has never been merciful. To this day Lin recalls the slickness of her mother's fingers, soaked in blood, as they brushed across her face, _seeing _her for the last time. Through the earth beneath them, Lin could feel her mother's weak heartbeat submit to eternal sleep. She had taken her mother's hand, then, and held it to her chest, willing her own heart to beat for both of them. But life, once lost, cannot be returned, and her mother's memory remains painted in crimson across her subconscious.

She remembers pain. White hot pain that brought sparks and stars into her vision before everything went black. She remembers the knife, gleaming in the moonlight. The smile, spreading across her attacker's face. The feel of his heavy body pinning her to the ground. The pressure of the point resting against her cheek. But mostly she remembers the screams. Her comrades, her friends…their voices joined together, too loud, too sharp, slicing through the air as the knife carved into the side of her face.

She remembers the heaviness of her limbs, the impossibility of movement as the Equalists shoved her into a miserable prison cell. She remembers her metal uniform feeling like a coffin, like a death shroud. Lifeless. No vibrations spoke to her, nothing answered to her feeble attempts to bend. She felt nothing, was nothing. Her body was battered, her energy spent, and as her eyes closed she fell into a nightmare that did not end until Korra restored her bending at the South Pole.

Ironically enough, the memories that drive her half to madness, the ones that rest her from her sleep and keep her awake for hours afterwards, tossing and turning and wishing she were anything but sober, are those that others would classify as "happy." The adventures. The smiles. The embraces. The laughter that she has not heard ever since he made off with another woman—no, a_ girl_—and left her alone, with nothing but the memory of his final touch: a tactless hand on her shoulder, attempting to quell the gale before it could lift him into the air at fifty miles per hour.

"Happy" memories cease to be so once the love that made them is lost.

There are other memories—small, insignificant recollections that came before or after. They are called to mind in the waking hour, in the moments when dreams and reality are intertwined. They blur the line between sleep and sobriety, twisting time, turning the hands of the clock back hours, days, months, years. She wakes in a daze each morning, unsure of where and _when_ she is. Pulling on her metal uniform brings her forcibly to the present, and she is able to carry on with her daily responsibilities, the cool metal against her skin keeping her grounded in the here and now.

It is a commonly held belief that one loses one's memory as time marches on, but for Lin, this is far from true. She prays for the ability to forget, for the comforting blanket of senility. She wishes she could hide behind her age—blame a foggy brain, a clouded mind—for her constant inability to keep her thoughts from dabbling through the decades, but she can't. She has aged gracefully, without any complications more serious than fatigue.

Good health isn't always a blessing.

There have been precious few people in Lin Bei Fong's life who have known that she has difficulty keeping her mind tied to the present. Most of them are dead, or worse. She generally doesn't speak of the people who are "worse."

Some wonder what it is exactly that Lin is trying to forget.

But there is one person who _knows_.

And to her memory, he has never said a word.


	6. Midnight

A/N: I don't own Legend of Korra

Prompt: Midnight

Tenzin became a father with thirty minutes till midnight. Long hours of sitting by his wife's side and coaxing her through her breathing exercises were finally rewarded by the first timid cry of an infant. Never before in his life had he heard a sound so beautiful, so capturing. When a small, precious bundle of blankets was passed to him, he thought his arms had been made for nothing else; the newborn fit so perfectly and safely inside them. It was a quarter to midnight, and as he looked upon his child's tiny face he swore that no harm would ever come to her.

He recalls another promise given under a full moon, nearly thirteen years ago. It was ten minutes to midnight, then, and he was with his love; a woman of green eyes and brown hair, of earth and dirt and _substance_. He held her close, felt her heartbeat flutter as he kissed her. Usually, she would keep him at a distance, but that night she let him come inside the walls she had built up for years and years after her mother's death. It was exhilarating, to have her in his arms. He knew she did not need his protection, but for one moment he allowed himself to pretend that_ he_ could be the one to take care of _her. _

In the years that followed, he spent many midnights wrapped in her arms. But the midnights he spent alone—staring at the hands on the clock, watching time tick away into the early hours of the morning—were the ones he remembered best. When he counted the twelve tolls of Lin's ancient grandfather clock (which had been her mother's, who could tell the time by the ring of the bells) echoing off the bare walls of her apartment, Tenzin found himself questioning the direction in which their relationship was going. Republic City was Lin's first and only child, and she had made it quite clear that she had no time for another.

It was five minutes to midnight on one of these long, lonesome evenings when Tenzin made a decision. He never wanted to spend another midnight alone.

And as he passed his newborn daughter back to his exhausted wife, he knew that the path he had chosen had been the right one. The tired smile she gave him and the baby flooded his chest with warmth. He knew that this was where he was meant to be, right here, with his wife and daughter.

Midnight came, but no clock struck twelve. There were no tolling bells, no rings to anxiously count—waiting for the last and praying the door would open before it sounded. There was no emptiness, no silent apartment with shadows rising and falling around him.

Instead, Midnight found him sitting on a warm bed with his loving wife beside him, holding a little miracle with a single dark brown tuft of hair whose name would be Jinora. He was a father, a husband, a man whose family was growing right before his eyes. This was the life he had chosen, this was his reality. He gave no thought to the vague illusions of the past hovering beyond the island.

Miles away from the happy family, shadows stretched surreptitiously across an apartment in the heart of Republic City, reaching out to comfort a silent woman cloaked in metal whose only companion was the moonlight. She did not need to listen for the tolls that shattered the silence she always clung to for strength; she knew what time it was when the shadows laid claim to her heart.

_Midnight._


	7. Hero

A/N: I do not own Legend of Korra

Prompt: Hero

They called her brave, for what she did. Selfless. Honorable.

They called her a martyr—no, a _hero_.

And she was no such thing.

Had they seen the fear, the sadness, the resignation in the eyes of the children that day—the day she willingly condemned herself to emptiness, to loss—they would know that what she did was not heroic.

Heroes have a choice. Heroes fight knowing fully well that they could back out, hit the road running, and never look back. Heroes have the opportunity to flee, but they choose to fight. That's why they are heroes. Heroes choose, and they choose valor.

Her mother was a hero. Toph Bei Fong had had the chance to run away from the war many times, but she stayed to see it through to the end. She had a home, a place where she could return and live an altogether different life, but she chose to follow the avatar, to help finish a war that had plagued the nations for far too long. Her mother had had a choice, and so had the others who fought alongside the avatar. They were the true heroes whose names had gone down in history for choosing the welfare of the world over themselves.

Lin was not a hero, because damn it, she didn't have a choice.

She had made a promise to protect Tenzin's family. When she was young, she followed him everywhere, scared that if she looked away, he would get hurt and she wouldn't be able to save him. Like that time he broke his arm when he fell from his glider. Like when she didn't see him of for an entire winter because he had pneumonia. Like when she joined the metalbending academy and he wound up in the hospital only days later after a nasty incident with a wild young sky bison that needed to be broken in. She was his shadow, his guardian, and at the time, he hated her for it. He hated that she worried about him, hated that she was always trying to take the punches aimed at him, hated how she put herself between him and his enemies. He didn't want her protection, didn't need it.

Well, he needed it _then_, as the airships were gaining speed and threatening to overtake them. He needed her, and she was ready. All her life, she had been waiting for the chance to prove that her devotion to him was pure. She didn't need to think twice before saving him.

But it wasn't because of Tenzin that she didn't have a choice. That sort of thing only happens in hopelessly tragic love stories. Lin's sacrifice was not an act of love.

When she jumped, she jumped for them all.

She jumped for Jinora, the girl whose birth announcement came to Lin in the mail and had her cold and bitter for weeks afterward, knowing that she hadn't wanted a child, but wishing things could have ended differently. The young girl looked so much like her mother, but when Lin saw the fright in her beautiful brown eyes as the airships drew nearer, all reservations she had about the girl were thrown into the wind.

She jumped for Ikki, wrapped in her older sister's arms, scared and looking as though at any moment she would begin to cry. The little girl was usually so full of life, so loquacious, that Lin could hardly stand her, but there was an endearing quality to her incessant blabber, and the metalbender could not help warming up to the girl.

She jumped for Meelo, the little tyke, who baffled all imagination. He was a peculiar child, but Lin imagined he would grow into a fine young boy in time.

She jumped for Pema, the bitter past forgotten. She saw the woman solely as a mother whose husband and children were in danger. The acolyte's expression was grave; she knew the bison could not outfly the airships, could not get her family to safety in time. She had the air of a woman drowning, and Lin had to look away.

She jumped for Rohan, the newborn baby held in his mother's arms. Lin foresaw a bright future for the infant, if only he could be given the chance…

She jumped for the family she would never have, the love she could no longer claim. She jumped, because there was no other way. She could not let this family be torn apart, could not live with herself if they were captured by a wicked, twisted man exacting his revenge from innocent people.

There was no decision to be made. She leapt from Oogi's back with a calm resolve to save the airbending race, or die trying. It was achingly simple, and exquisitely unromantic. Her motivation was not love, but loyalty.

She thought of their terror-stricken faces as she tore into the first airship. She thought of the innocence of the children, the newness of their lives. They were too young to be caught up in a war.

She thought of her childhood spent chasing after Tenzin, trying to keep up. He was often unreachable, and she was seldom rewarded for her efforts to make him laugh. Even as a child, Tenzin had been far too serious. Now, with the lives of his children on the line, with a war whose end was nowhere in sight, Lin doubted if she would ever have the opportunity to make him laugh again.

She launched herself off the first airship and onto the second, metal hitting metal as she quickly gained her bearings. Tearing apart the metal roof was oddly therapeutic for the anxiety that had grown in the pit of her stomach. When the wires wrapped around her and electricity tore through her body, she knew her time was up. She was not going to be the hero of this tragedy, but perhaps she had bought her old friend some time, and that was enough.

When rough equalist gloves shoved her down onto her knees in front of Amon, she could vaguely sense the once-familiar vibrations of Air Temple Island beneath her. It seemed all too fitting that this island would be where her story began and ended. Open and shut, like an ancient, time-worn tragedy told far too many times.

As she closed her eyes and felt the rain fall upon her face, Lin did not once consider herself a martyr.

And never, in all the years that followed, did she believe she was worthy of the title Meelo had given her.

(a hero)


	8. Winter

A/N: I don't own Legend of Korra, but here is some fun Linzin drama/friendship/angst to get you through the day!

_**Winter**_

"I won't go."

"Lin…"

"You can't make me!"

Sigh. Why must she be so _difficult_?

"Please?"

"No."

"_Lin."_

"I said no!"

The holidays were always a stressful time for Tenzin. Gifts, donations, good cheer, family, cooking, benevolence, excitement, parties and the like… It was all rather taxing. He didn't have time for all the merry-making on Air Temple Island that came with the week that began with the Winter Solstice festival and ended with the New Year's Celebration. He needed this time to train if he wanted to receive his tattoos before his eighteenth birthday, less than a year away.

But seeing as his mother had roped him into attending the celebratory ball held every year at City Hall on the night of the Winter Solstice, he needed to practice his waltz. Preferably with a partner. Of the female persuasion.

This is where Tenzin reached an impasse. For you see, Lin Bei Fong, the only girl he had within a reasonable distance, had refused to attend the ball. Every year since Tenzin was thirteen and Lin was twelve, Aang and Katara had insisted they go together. The two young benders had griped and moaned for days before finally accepting the invitation.

They were terribly uncoordinated, the first time they had tried to dance together. Tenzin would step forward, expecting Lin to step back, but she would be too slow, or too fast, or too forceful, and they would collide. Or, if Tenzin was lucky, he would fall on his own before she had the chance to shove him away. He would sputter, she would smirk, and they would continue practicing until _finally_ they got it right.

Every year since Tenzin was thirteen, he counted on Lin to be his (unwilling, but resigned) partner. They practiced a week in advance, going over the most basic steps and then moving to more advanced routines. By the time the ball arrived, they would be perfectly in sync, moving gracefully across the floor as if there had never been a time when they hadn't danced together well.

With only a few days remaining till the ball, one can imagine Tenzin's desperation to change Lin's mind and change it quickly. If she didn't go, he would be alone. And at seventeen years old, Tenzin was disinclined to show up to the biggest gala of the year unaccompanied.

He could try to find another partner, of course, but that would require leaving Air Temple Island at a time when all hands were needed to prepare for the festivities. Whether he liked it or not, he was stuck with Lin, and so too, was she with him.

Which brought him back to his current dilemma.

"Lin, please, it's just one night! We don't even have to dance the whole time if you don't want to," Tenzin bargained, following her as she walked out to the training grounds, feet crunching into the seasonal frost beneath them. Snow covered everything, cloaking the island in white.

Tenzin had always loved the snow; it made everything look so much more special, more beautiful. Lin, on the other hand, made no secret of her hatred for the winter weather. Her shoulders were set, her stride determined as she found her usual training spot where she had cleared away the snow so she could bend the frozen earth beneath.

"I'm not going. Period. Go find some other girl to parade around the dance floor," said Lin, stopping short and dropping down to the ground to go through her daily stretching routine. Her heavy winter clothes made movement difficult, so she discarded her confining jacket in favor of the loose sweater beneath and also dropped the gloves that made bending her fingers nearly impossible.

"Lin, come on. We've gone together for the past three years. What's so different about this year that you suddenly don't want to go?" Tenzin asked, folding his legs beneath him so he could sit beside her as she trained. He tucked his gloved hands into his jacket, the mittens failing to keep the bite of the frigid air away. He should have brought a scarf. Or two.

Lin didn't answer. Instead, she continued her stretches, loosening up her body for the brutal workout she had planned for herself. She needed some stress relief desperately, and there was no better cure for the tension that claimed her every muscle than what her mother used to call a "pound session." Essentially, this was an all-encompassing phrase for when she and her mother would work themselves beyond their breaking points, over and over, all day, until they collapsed from exhaustion or serious injury (or both).

Tenzin was familiar with these motions. This was how he knew there was something wrong that she wasn't telling him; Lin never resorted to "pound sessions" unless she was extremely upset. For a month after her mother's funeral, Lin attempted to go days on end with no food or water, training from sun up to sun down in the area near the airbending gates. Aang, Katara, Tenzin, and even Bumi had tried to stop her, for it seemed she was hell-bent on killing herself. Eventually her body had given up, and Katara locked Lin in her new room in the female dormitories for nearly a week afterwards to give her destroyed body a chance to recuperate.

That was nearly nine months ago. Tenzin had thought Lin had finally come to terms with her mother's death, but from the way she was pounding her fists into the ground with such reckless abandon, he suspected otherwise.

"Lin?" his voice was soft as he continued to watch her raise large sections of the earth up into the air. "Lin, please, just talk to me. It's okay if you don't want to go to the ball. I just want to make sure you're all right."

His words were lost among the sounds of Lin's heavy breathing and impassioned bending. For an hour straight he watched her twist and turn, punch and kick, jump and dive until she was sweaty and bleeding. Finally, when it looked as though she planned to destroy the training area entirely, Tenzin stepped in to stop her.

He used his airbending to lift him up onto the pillar of earth she had erected. When she turned on him, he saw that there were angry tears mixing with the bleeding scratches on her face from where stray bits of rock and ice had hit her in her rage. She seemed to fall apart, right there, standing on the pillar with Tenzin looking deeply through her eyes and into the turmoil beneath.

The pillar fell back into the ground. Tenzin caught Lin before she, too, would fall. Her strength was gone. The storm had passed. She was vulnerable and weak, and he was the only one allowed to see her like that. To save her from herself.

It had started snowing. Heavy flakes fell from the sky, tangling in Lin's sweaty, matted hair. Her fingers were completely numb, but she still lifted them to tug at the offending flakes.

"Mother always hated winter," she choked.

With no words to say to ease Lin's pain, Tenzin simply held her closer. When the wind picked up, he airbended the snow away from them and easily lifted her up into his arms. Dancing could wait. For now, he would sit her by the fire and make her forget. Forget the snow, the hail, the ice, the pain. Forget black clothing and the empty space at the dinner table. Forget the absence of color, the absence of life. Forget that winter had come, and with it, the memory of the last Winter Solstice, where her mother sulked all night in an elaborate gown that did nothing to make her appear more approachable. Though she had hated the season, hated the weather, hated everything that the holidays had to offer, her mother had still clapped and smiled when she sensed her daughter and Tenzin spinning gracefully around the dance floor.

Winter was supposed to be a time to remember the important things in life. But for Lin, it would always be, at its core, a season for forgetting.


	9. Resiliency

A/N: I do not own Legend of Korra. Just to clarify to those who read this collection of prompts/one-shots and think that they've seen all these chapters before, somewhere else, I want to explain: I usually post the chapters of this story on my Tumblr as well. There is no stealing of material going on. This is my writing, and the writing on my tumblr is also my own. This is where I can keep the prompts together, whereas on my tumblr, it is difficult to connect the chapters. If you've seen this exact writing before, it is because you are looking at my tumblr: concreteangel1221. Sorry for any confusion that has been caused.

_**Resiliency**_

Katara knew, from the moment she discovered that her son was dating Toph's daughter, that their love would be a strong one. She knew, without being able to say _how_ she knew, that it would be long lasting and eternal, like the love she shared with her own husband. She knew, but she could not say so, because she also knew that when you're young, there is nothing standing in the way of love.

She could not say the same, once they had grown.

She had been watching them since they were little, yet she missed all the necessary signs. They were too different—oil and water, earth and air—and could not be counted on to make compromises. They were both too proud for their own good, and pride was a sin in and of itself. Sinners, all of them, with no opportunity for absolution.

At least they had each other.

Well, most of the time. Lin had a tendency to overwork, and Tenzin had a predisposition for bringing work home with him. Quarterly reports, court cases, political statements…Tenzin was never without his other obligations.

In time, it was only practical for them to part ways.

Katara remembers the day the couple separated. She remembers, because she was there. Listening behind closed doors, curious as to what they possibly had to say that could not be said in front of her.

She regrets overhearing the conversation, not because it was an invasion of privacy, but because the words haunted her ever afterward as confessions she should have never known, but did.

There are some things a mother needs to know about her son.

She learned that day that who he loved was not one of them.

Katara remembers the shock, the pain, the betrayal in Lin's voice.

"You…you love her?" No anger, just disbelief.

"Yes." It was the truth.

"Despite…despite everything we've been through?"

There was a short period of silence. If Katara had had the ability to move, she would have gone as far away from the door as possible. But something rooted her to the ground. Something dark and dreadfully heavy. She almost didn't catch his solemn response.

"Yes."

"How long?" There may have been a twinge of anger there. It was hard to say, with the door between them.

"Sorry?"

"How long have you loved her, and not told me?" Demanding. Hurt. But also, resigned.

Katara could practically hear her son's guilt and discomfort in the silence that followed.

"That long? Well, I suppose it's for the best you didn't tell me, then. Why choose one, when you can easily pretend to love both? Goodbye, Tenzin."

Katara knew she should move away from the door when she heard Lin's heavy footsteps walking towards it, but her legs would not comply. Was it really going to end this way?

"Wait." Tenzin seemed to have similar thoughts.

Katara imagined Lin stopping, inches from the door, but refusing to turn around.

"I wasn't pretending, Lin. I do love you…just not the way I did when we were younger."

Katara vaguely could hear the falling, the descent, the destruction of something beautiful and irreparable.

"I need a family, Lin." He was imploring her to understand. This wasn't a betrayal. It was just business. Logical. A balance of budget, of time wasted and needs unfulfilled. A valid conclusion, with reasonable data to support it. This admission was rational, practical, and simple.

Everything love wasn't.

"I suppose that's your way of legitimizing it all? We had our first kiss before she was even _alive_."

"Lin—"

"No, that's fine. Age is but a number, of course. She'll bear you many strong, healthy airbenders, I'm sure, and you will finally have the family you deserve. What more could you want?" Lin's voice trembled a bit, threatening to tip over the edge and let tears spill and sobs sound, but she was stronger than that. She had always been stronger than what threatened to tear her apart.

Katara finally willed her body to move. Down the hall she went, in a fog, trying to piece together the meaning of what she had just overheard. When Lin left, she knew it would never be the same between them. This really was goodbye, and it sickened Katara to think that she had ever thought their love to be invincible.

In the days that followed, Katara pretended not to notice Tenzin's despair. When he finally told her that he had ended things with Lin, she put on a face of shock that only deepened his guilt. She did not ask for a reason, seeing as she already knew, but he seemed to need to say it, over and over again, to make it right. To make it real and good and honorable.

"She doesn't want children, Mom. I thought she would come around, but Lin never changes her mind. And Pema has made it quite clear that she would love to be a mother."

"I understand." She did, in truth. She understood the burden, the strain of knowing that you must make sacrifices for the good of the people. The world needed more airbenders. But Lin, like her mother, never wanted a child. It is difficult to love someone who wants entirely different things out of life.

But it is even harder to know that love, true love, cannot be killed by time alone. Moving on, getting married, having children…nothing will erase what came before. Just as Sokka was never able to stop loving Yue, Tenzin would never entirely rid his heart of Lin's memory.

Love is resilient; it recovers, it endures, it remains long after harsh words and brusque goodbyes.

When Katara sees Lin years later, in the aftermath of a war whose reverberations were still being felt throughout the city, she realizes that love is incredibly, incredibly cruel. That Lin had been put in the position to save the man—whom she still loved—and his family—whom she had resented, but eventually accepted…

The Spirits certainly have a strange sense of humor.

Some say love lasts forever. Others argue it can be lost, broken, or betrayed; warped and bent until it is unrecognizable. Some say that if it fades into the background and vanishes without a trace, it isn't love.

But all Katara has ever known for sure about love is that it is resilient.


	10. Promise

A/N: I don't own Legend of Korra. Sorry this chapter is so much longer than the others! I got carried away…

_**Promise**_

"I didn't ask for you to come after me."

"I wasn't aware that I needed an invitation…"

Why, _why_ did he have to follow her? Couldn't he let her be merciless, just this once? Couldn't he let her forget her title, her reputation, and just serve justice the way her mother would have done it? She didn't pity killers. Didn't condone murder. Didn't let murderers_ live_.

He didn't understand. _His_ mother has spent her years taking care of her children, her family, her household._ His_ mother was never in danger nowadays unless she _chose_ to be. His mother was a healer, not a fighter, not a soldier, not a target of the cruelest men in the city.

He didn't—no, _couldn't_—understand what she was going through. His mother was alive.

Hers was nothing but ash.

For seven years she had been tracking her mother's killer. Seven years of reconnaissance, police work, detective work, and the like. Seven years of thrilling excitement when they found a lead, and seven years of crushing disappointment when, inevitably, the lead led to nowhere. Nothing. A stone wall.

Too bad her mother wasn't a part of the search—stone walls were her favorite.

She had gotten a call at headquarters this afternoon saying the man she had been looking for was spotted just outside of Republic City, in a shady bar doing deals with the city's underground crime ring where they thought they would not be discovered. Lin was out the door before she even properly ended the call. At her apartment, she removed her uniform and replaced it with civilian clothing. If she was going to succeed tonight, she needed her target and his accomplices to be in the dark as to her identity for as long as possible.

How Tenzin had found out where she was going and what she intended to do, she could only guess. He has many connections in the city as the youngest member of the council, and she wouldn't be surprised if he had bribed some of them to keep tabs on her, should she be planning to do something particularly reckless.

His faith in her was astounding.

Of course, she knew he just wanted her to be safe. At twenty-two, she already had a reputation for getting herself into sticky situations. Her scars remind her colleagues and neighbors that she is even stronger than the metal that she wields; stronger than any of them would expect her to be, given her youth. She was offered the position of Chief of Police when they realized the lengths to which she was willing to go to keep her city safe. Still, many doubted her ability to lead, seeing as she had always preferred to work alone.

Alone, she was swift. Decisive. Uncompromising. Alone, she could do things the way she saw fit, not the way the general public demanded. Alone, she could give criminals and murderers the punishments they deserved. She had always thought that the limitations of the law prevented the proper sentencing of wicked individuals. The members of the council had soft stomachs, forgiving hearts, and political affiliations that prevented them from bestowing on criminals the same amount of cruelty as they themselves exercised on their own victims.

There was one council member who had the least tolerance for violence of them all. And he just so happened to believe it was his personal duty to ensure that Lin did not go too far with her enforcement of "justice." Which was why he was following her, at this very moment.

Lin had no patience for tagalongs.

"Tenzin, go home. It's late. I don't need a babysitter." Lin said the last five words with distaste, as if she wanted to spit them onto the ground at his feet but couldn't. He was her boyfriend, after all, and she really should be grateful that he cared so much about her. But when it came to matters of justice, not even Tenzin would be able to stop her.

"Is it true you're going after Satu?" Tenzin's voice was calm, even as Lin began to run and he was forced to pick up speed as well.

"Who told you that?"

"Just answer the question."

"Yes."

Lin started to sprint, the edges of the city giving way to more scattered buildings and houses. Now, to find the bar Satu had been spotted in…

Tenzin persisted. "And how exactly were you planning to arrest him on your own?"

Harsh, cold, sharp, and dripping with malice, Lin's response reached him, "I'm not going to_ arrest_ him."

"I see." Tenzin had thought as much. Tonight, Lin was not Chief of Police. He didn't need to ask what she was really planning—he knew from the fire in her eyes and the steel in her voice. He knew exactly what she left unsaid.

_(I'm going to __kill__ him)._

They slowed their pace back down to a walk. It is generally more inconspicuous for two strangers to walk through unfamiliar streets than it is for them to sprint, and they did not want to be discovered. As darkness began to stretch over unkempt houses and shoddy walkways, Lin knew they had arrived in the right place. This was the poorer side of the town, where criminals could easily meet and greet one another in bars, restaurants, and alleyways practically unnoticed, just far enough away from Republic City to not have to worry about the police walking in on their negotiations.

Lin came to an abrupt stop outside the first dingy bar they came to. It seemed to match the description that her reporting officer had given her; it looked to have originally been a bed and breakfast, if the carving in the wood above the door could be trusted, but currently the upper floors were most likely vacant while the bottom doubled as a meeting place and drinking house.

"Last chance, Tenzin. Go home." The flickering lamp light coming from within the bar cast half her face in shadow. She was on a mission, and no matter how much she loved him, she did not want him getting involved.

"I'm not letting you go in there alone," he said as he pointed to the filthy "open" sign and raised the hood of his traveling robes, effectively hiding his tattoos from view.

Searching his serious expression, Lin could see that it was no use. He was determined to stay. She pulled up her own hood and wrapped a scarf around her face to hide her scars.

"Fine. But we're doing this my way, understood?"

"Of course," Tenzin replied as she pushed open the door.

The stench of unwashed bodies and spilled alcohol made Tenzin wish he didn't have a sense of smell as he picked his way through the many occupied chairs and tables around the bar. There was an open space in the middle of the stone floor, as though at one time there were patrons who enjoyed dancing, but tonight all of the bar's occupants were busy nursing cups of alcohol or having loud, drunken discussions with each other from across the room. A few of the customers stared at the two unfamiliar faces weaving around them, particularly Lin's, for most of her face was hidden by the dark brown fabric of her simple scarf.

Lin made a beeline for the bar counter. Tenzin knew Lin wasn't very fond of alcohol—her mother had had a tendency to drink too much at celebrations, leaving Lin to do damage control in her wake—but it would be suspicious for a couple to come into a bar without purchasing _something_. The bartender leered at her from over the counter, his sweaty fingers lingering in her palm as he took the money she offered.

She bought two drinks with the air of someone who didn't care much what she drank so long as it was strong. She handed a glass to Tenzin with a sharp look that said he had better play along, thanked the bartender, who was still eyeing her like a meal, and then scouted out the room for a spot where they could easily observe the other patrons. The bar was noisy and crowded, but they managed to find a table along one of the dirty stone walls of the establishment.

Lin sat with her back straight, eyes keen. She would recognize her target on sight, if only because his face had haunted her nightmares for seven long, sleepless years.

The drink in her hand was awfully enticing at the moment—with the hazy snippets of a half-remembered hallucination swirling behind her eyes—but she didn't consider when she bought it that drinking would require pulling down her scarf. It seemed silly that she was hiding from him, when what she really needed to do was find him.

Still, it would be risking too much to assume that_ he_ would have forgotten_ her_.

She was renowned both in and out of Republic City for her skills, her face pictured on the front pages of hundreds of newspapers throughout the nations. It was as though the media was broadcasting her to criminals everywhere, warning them that hers was not the face they wanted to see when they were up to something rotten. Satu would know about her scars, would know that she had taken over the same position as her mother. He would know that she wasn't a little girl anymore, and that she was a threat that needed to be taken out…

As a master airbender who was very adamant about maintaining the traditions of the air nomads, Tenzin abstained from alcohol unless there was a call for celebration. Absently swirling the liquid in his glass, Tenzin watched Lin watch everyone else, and could not help but wonder what she was thinking. With only her green eyes showing above her scarf, he could not read her expression, and it frustrated him. He was so used to knowing her every thought, her every move, that it was unnerving to suddenly be so clueless.

Time stretched on and Lin seemed to grow more anxious by the minute. The cloak that covered her civilian clothing was nondescript, but it did nothing to hide the shapeliness of her figure. She had grown into a beautiful woman, and Tenzin could not help the possessiveness and anger that rose inside him as several men in the bar seemed to take notice of this fact themselves. Her scarf gave her an air of mystery that was admittedly very alluring, and he was fiercely protective of her ever since they became an "item" a few years ago.

There was one man in particular who seemed far too interested in Lin as she scanned the faces of each and every person present. The man sat on the opposite side of the bar with a couple of his friends drinking and carrying on around him. He had dark brown eyes and a sharp nose that hooked at the end, which was a trait commonly found in this area of the world. He wore black robes with a golden design embroidered into the sleeves and carried what looked to be many different types of knives tucked into his belt.

As Tenzin watched, the man leaned over to one of his comrades and said something quietly in his ear. His companion nodded and left the table. When the hooked-nosed man sent another glance Lin's way, Tenzin caught his dark gaze and held it for a moment. The man smiled broadly, maliciously, and then turned back to join in the conversation that was going on around him.

"Lin?" said Tenzin quietly, leaning over the table so his voice would not need to carry very far. "There's a man in black and gold across the way I think you may want to take a look at."

Slowly, Lin allowed her eyes to drift over to the man in question. He seemed to be spinning a yarn for the two men seated nearest to him, completely absorbed in the telling of the story. Lin's face betrayed nothing of her worry as she said, "That's one of Satu's followers, Chen. He's pretty harmless, compared to his master, but I wouldn't underestimate his accuracy with his knives. At least we know Satu is still around here somewhere."

Lin returned to her previous scanning, while Tenzin kept his eyes on Chen. Even with Lin's claim that Chen wasn't to be feared, it made him uncomfortable to think that they were going to willingly let a criminal continue on with his illicit activities. Nervously taking a sip of his drink, Tenzin grimaced. He didn't like being in the company of rats.

It was perhaps a half an hour later when Lin suddenly stood, her untouched drink nearly slipping from her shaking fingers. "He's...he's_ above_ us. I can sense him. All the floors of the old bed and breakfast are partially made of stone." Lin's eyes locked with his as she let her feet tell her all the information they could gather from the earth beneath her. "He came in the servant's entrance. There's a staircase through the door to my right that he used to get to the second floor."

As quickly as she could without raising suspicion, Lin left her drink on the table and started weaving through the many obstacles between her and the door. Tenzin followed closely behind her, suddenly aware that Chen had risen from his seat as well. A sharp sense of foreboding pierced his heart when he realized that it was very likely that this was a trap. Why would Satu lead them up to the second floor otherwise?

But through the door they went, trying to be as unobtrusive as possible. The last thing they needed were witnesses to Lin avenging her mother's death. They found the winding staircase just beyond the door and started climbing. Lin was taking the steps two at a time, increasing her speed as she went. When they reached the landing, Lin turned left, practically sprinting to the end of the hall. She came to a stop before a room bearing the number 217 carved into its heavy wooden door.

Tenzin watched as Lin's body went incredibly still, staring into the old wooden door as though it held every secret she had ever wanted to know.

"Tenzin?" she whispered, eyes still glued to the door. The scarf made her words nearly unintelligible, but Tenzin managed to understand the rest, "Please…stay out here. Promise me that no matter what you hear, you won't come in?"

She was trembling now as she tore her gaze away from the door and met his eyes. She was begging him, and to his knowledge, Lin had never begged him for anything before. He could understand her need to face her mother's killer alone, but how was he to explain to his mother and father, should something go wrong, that he essentially promised _not _to save the life of his oldest and closest friend?

She took his hands in hers and whispered one final, desperate, "_Please_."

Frozen inside, he could only nod his head, which seemed to be enough for her. She embraced him quickly, then moved to open the door. True to his word—or rather, his nod—he did not follow her, and so she entered the room alone.

When Tenzin could hear the unmistakable sounds of a body being slammed into a wall a few moments later, it took every ounce of his willpower not to use his airbending to reduce the wooden door to splinters.

Lin had never been particularly fond of hotel rooms, and she imagined that after tonight, she would never willingly step into one again.

Opposite the door, sitting in a plush armchair next to a crackling fire, was the man who had visited her so often in her nightmares. He was a tall man with a muscular build that spoke either of hard labor or a harsh training regime. His red robes were simple, his belt a heavy black line that divided the upper and lower halves of his body. His eyes—demon eyes, she thinks—were golden brown and always shining with malevolence. Brown hair of the deepest shade was slicked back against his skull. Perhaps these features had made him handsome, sometime in the far-gone past, but the wicked sneer that curled his lips spoke of the blackened heart that beat within his chest.

"These seven years have served you well, Ms. Bei Fong," said Satu, his lips curling back to reveal several sharp teeth in what she supposed was his attempt at a smile.

Slowly, carefully, Lin unwound the scarf that was wrapped around her face. It had only been useful so long as it had concealed her identity. Satu's smile widened as he saw the scars that lay beneath it.

"Well, I have to say, those scars suit you. It's a pity I wasn't the one to put them there," Satu mused as he stood from the armchair, reaching his full height. He certainly knew how to intimidate his prey, but Lin was no longer afraid. She wasn't the scared little fifteen-year-old girl she was when she first saw him. She was older, stronger, and wiser than she'd ever been…and she had promised herself that this nightmare was going to end tonight, no matter what.

"I've waited seven years for this, Satu. Don't make me wait any longer," Lin's voice was controlled, but her heart was not. It was beating faster and faster, wildly throwing itself against her chest. Satu seemed to sense this, and so began to laugh the cold, heartless laugh that had echoed in her mind and memory ever since the day she watched her mother die.

He was on her in a flash. Knocked off her feet, she was slammed into the wall with such great force that all the dusty paintings that hung around the room fell to the ground.

"Impatient, just like your mother. She practically_ begged_ for death, by the end of it." Satu had both hands against her throat, strangling her with her feet unable to touch the ground. He was speaking with his lips brushing against her right ear in such a way that it may have been sensual, had he not been simultaneously preventing oxygen from reaching her lungs. She clawed at his hands, trying desperately to free herself, but it was no use. He was too strong. She was losing consciousness just when he decided to release her.

Gasping for air, Lin fell into a heap on the ground. Lifting a shaking hand to her neck, she could feel the bruises already forming where his fingers had nearly crushed her windpipe.

"I don't need my bending to kill you. They say strangulation is one of the most painful ways to die. I wouldn't know myself, of course. I could just as easily kill you with a knife, a sword, a twist to the neck perhaps… But I knowI personally would prefer something a bit more _familiar_, wouldn't you?"

As he spoke, he moved fluidly into a firebending stance, drawing flames from the fireplace behind him and dancing them around her head so she could feel the oppressive heat surround her. She was still trying urgently to draw air into her neglected lungs, gasping and heaving, but she had little success.

"That was how your mother died, wasn't it? Fire and blood? Such a lovely combination," Satu's voice was sickeningly sweet as he drew a knife from within his robes and held it in the hand that was not bending the fire around her.

Knowing she had to act quickly lest she be burned to a crisp, Lin forced herself to push away from him, rolling and kicking up pieces of the stone floor to send them flying in his direction. Once again his callous laughter filled the room.

"Finally, a challenge. I was beginning to think the newspapers have been lying all these years about your skills, Ms. Bei Fong," Satu said as he dodged the many attacks sent his way. He used her last name deliberately, digging into her memory of how he addressed her mother. Now that she was fighting back, the _real_ amusement could begin.

Outside the room, Tenzin was having problems of his own. Chen had followed them out of the bar and up the staircase, ready to take out anyone who interfered with his master's plans.

"You know, I knew from the moment I saw you that you weren't from around here. It's not often that you see a man walking like a ballerina in this side of town," said Chen, smirking as though what he said was the cleverest insult that's ever been told. "And I would recognize that Bei Fong broad anywhere. You don't see eyes like hers out here in the slums."

He was removing his knives from his belt as he spoke, tossing them with a flourish into the air. He walked towards Tenzin, steps even, controlled, almost _feline_, as if he were stalking the airbender.

"That Bei Fong girl's been on Satu's hit-list longer than anyone else. He just needed the opportunity to go in for the kill. And looky-here, you two come waltzing in like you own the place. Not very bright, if you ask me," Chen was waving a knife carelessly in front of him, like it was a child's toy. "She's probably dead by now. It's a shame, too. She's one fine looking woman. Or at least she _was_."

Tenzin blew a strong gust of air straight towards Chen's chest, but the criminal was quicker than he anticipated. Chen dodged the gust and threw two of his knives with deadly force and accuracy towards Tenzin's solar plexus and neck. It was only with his superior airbending movements that Tenzin managed to avoid the knives.

Chen produced five smaller weapons from within his sleeves and launched them in an arc after using the wall as leverage to get a better angle. Tenzin managed to maneuver around the arc, bending the air to bring the weapons uselessly to the ground. Quickly and powerfully, Tenzin airbended Chen backwards, down the hallway and towards the stairwell. The man tried to get another good shot with his knives, but Tenzin had no patience for playing that game anymore. It was only with a small twinge of unease that he sent the man flying over the edge of the stairs, down to the first floor. When Chen didn't immediately stir, Tenzin knew he wasn't going to be getting up any time soon, if at all.

Lin had battled strong opponents before, but never in such a confined area, with so little earth at her disposal. Yes, the floor had a layer of stone, but this was too shallow to be of any real use. She was bleeding and burned, and she had to rely mostly on her agility to avoid Satu's attacks, so she was quickly running out of strength.

Finally, Satu succeeded in pinning her down onto the ground with his knife pressed against her bruised throat. "If you want to know the truth, killing your mother wasn't very satisfying. My favorite part is watching the light leave the person's eyes, and she didn't have any real light in hers to begin with. But yours, _yours_ are eyes I can watch…"

The knife bit a little into her skin, and Lin knew this was her last chance to live. With all the strength she had left, she brought her knees up to her chest and kicked them out, into Satu's stomach. He landed heavily on his back, and Lin was on him in an instant, the knife now in her grasp. She didn't wait, didn't think, didn't breathe as she thrust the knife into Satu's chest. _She _didn't watch the light leave his eyes; she closed her own as she dug the knife deeper into his solar plexus. She wasn't a monster. She wasn't like him.

Lin would not open her eyes until she felt his heart stop beating. Even then, she let go of the knife—his crimson blood stained her clothes and skin in a way that made her stomach flip—and climbed shakily to her feet before she allowed her eyelids to flutter open. The deed was done. Satu was dead. But whether the nightmare had ended or not remained to be seen as she stumbled over to the door. She had several nasty burns on her arms and legs, a few deep slices in her sides where his knife had just barely missed lodging itself in her flesh, and her throat still seared from the attempted strangulation. She gained no pleasure from Satu's death; just relief that he was no longer a threat to her city, to her friends, to herself.

Lin reached the door, but the floor seemed to tilt beneath her feet. Her head felt strange, her brain muddled. She opened the door, took a few shaky steps out into the hall, and collapsed just as Tenzin realized she had made it out alive and rushed over to her.

"Lin! Lin, are you all right?"

She tried to nod, _yes, yes, I'm fine, I'm alive, it's all right, I'm okay_…

But her head is too heavy. The words don't come.

Tenzin ducks into room 217 to confirm, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Satu is dead. He returns moments later, gathers Lin into his arms, and carries her all the way back to Republic City, whispering soothing words while he tries to keep her awake. If she loses consciousness, she could fall into a coma, and he would never forgive himself…

Walking through Republic City with the battered, burned, and bleeding chief of police in his arms, Tenzin realizes just how many people in the city care about her wellbeing. He insists that she'll be fine; he just needs to get her to his mother as quickly as possible.

"Tenzin?" Lin's croak surprises him as he boards the boat that will take them across Yue Bay to Air Temple Island. "P-Please don't tell your mother what I've done."

Tenzin tries to quiet her, certain she is delirious, that she doesn't even know what she's saying, but her eyes shine with sorrow and guilt that is so acute he cannot help but listen to her words.

"Please…Aunt Katara spared the life of the man who killed _her_ mother." And suddenly it all made sense. Tenzin had thought she killed Satu without any regrets, but he was wrong. Oh so incredibly wrong…

"Don't…don't let her know I didn't do the same…please." Her voice was faded, washed out, but clear enough for Tenzin to know that she knew _exactly _what she was saying.

"I won't," he whispers, not sure if she is aware enough to hear him.

"Promise?" her voice is so small, so light, so unbelievably unlike her own.

"I promise."


	11. Simplicity

A/N: I do not own Legend of Korra. Thanks everyone for all the kind reviews! I love hearing what you have to think. It makes my day, it really does.

_**Simplicity**_

Toph Bei Fong had always valued simplicity.

Food, water, shelter. Three basic needs, three statutes of living. Besides these three, there was nothing _absolutely necessary_ to life. Companionship was a close fourth, but Toph had been alone before. Loneliness did not equate to death.

And then she had a baby—the father long gone (he wasn't one of her three basic needs)—and suddenly, she was never alone again.

Babies are needy. Babies require time, commitment, responsibility. Babies demand attention, command patience, gentility and care. Babies don't understand the tenants of survival. They need to be taught.

And teach Lin she did. She taught her how to feel the vibrations of the earth, how to live off of the land like their ancestors had done hundreds of years before. She taught her to be strong, like stone—to need nothing more than what Mother Nature provided. She taught her to stand her ground, to live a life of substance. But most of all, Toph taught her daughter the beauty of simplicity.

Lin learned. Lin learned from experience, from careful and frequent practice. She learned to need nothing that she could not provide for herself. Through swelteringly hot days and icily cold nights she survived, blindfolded and left to her own defenses from the ripe old age of eight. Some called Toph's methods "extreme," but the renowned earthbender would only smile and say that nothing in nature was too extreme for a Bei Fong.

Nothing, perhaps, except the one thing Toph Bei Fong never completely understood, and thus never tried to teach her daughter.

(how to be in love)

* * *

Lin had always valued simplicity. She saw the world solely in black and white—a courtesy to her mother, who only ever could see the black—and had no patience for the varying shades of gray that tended to complicate matters that could otherwise be straightforward. She was abrupt and abrasive, and never bothered to deal in the murky undercurrents of young emotional follies.

That was a lie. She had bothered, once upon a time. But that _particular_ story book was in the trash, rotting among apple cores and congealed blood that turned red bandages to brown. Story books are useless wastes of time, because they teach nothing of survival; only mushy maxims, sappy sonnets, and moral-less moralities.

Lin had never been a fan of children's literature.

(Which was true, if only because those thin little books reminded her of the single most painful question she had ever asked in her toddler years: "Mama, can you read me a story?")

Lin was an experienced survivor who understood what was necessary and what was not. Food was necessary, leisure was not. A home was a luxury, but shelter—as in, a tarp overhead or an earthen tent—was not. Water kept people alive; love did nothing of the sort.

In fact, one might say that love shortened one's life span. Indefinitely.

She had seen people die for their lovers, seen them ache and pine and grieve their lives away. She had watched love lead to sacrifice, which led to despair, which led to a hearse. It was really quite distasteful, having to watch friends and family sob and weep outside her door, asking her to bring their loved ones back, to bring justice into this world of loss. She was an officer, not a Spirit. The only consolation she could give was that the criminal who killed their precious people would be in chains before the night was through.

She'd seen people driven half to madness looking for affection that would last a lifetime. It sounded romantic, giving up one's clearness of mind for love. It wasn't.

Because humans are built for survival. They are adaptable creatures who bend their environment to their will, to meet their needs and wants. They are the prey of no animal; they have removed themselves almost entirely from the food chain, sitting atop the pyramid on a pedestal of bones. They leave a harsh and searing mark upon the earth, tearing down forests and building houses for their families, so that love can flourish and grow and multiply, like bacteria. The infection spreads, and the earth suffers, and the humans suffer too—but that's what they call life.

Survival is simple. Her mother taught her everything she needed to know to survive among the animals and plants, everything she ought to understand to be in harmony with nature. Survival is quite free of complications, if you know how to live.

And it is ironic, Lin thinks, that she would give up this life she has worked so hard at keeping because all she was ever taught was how to save herself. But, having never properly understood the realm of human affection, she supposes that the irony loses strength when she considers that she is one of those miserable creatures who cannot survive without love.

Lin had always valued simplicity, because her mother taught her well how to survive. But now, Lin knows that half of living is learning how to die in such a way that your life was not wasted on worthless things.

And love, though it is far from simple and increases one's risk of death exponentially, is not a worthless thing.


	12. Summer

A/N: Thanks again for the reviews! I love you all and I hope you enjoy this next chapter. Summer is nearly gone, and I felt the need to write about what summer means to Tenzin. I don't own Legend of Korra.

_**Summer**_

Tenzin had always loved the summer. It was his absolute favorite time of the year. Summer meant steamy days and starry nights, humid mornings and stormy afternoons. Summer was languid and leisurely, often spent lazing by the shore for hours with nowhere to go and nothing to do. Summer meant no studying, no exams, no classes taken with unruly acolyte children who poked Tenzin with their grimy fingers and cheated off his papers because he was the _Avatar's son_ and ought to know his history (and arithmetic and science and philosophy and spirits-know-what-else that his teachers expected him to memorize and regurgitate onto his tests perfectly, like a machine). But what Tenzin looked forward to most about the summer had nothing to do with the lovely weather or the lack of responsibility. To him, summer would always mean something incredibly more special.

To him, summer meant _Lin_.

Lin went to school in Republic City, but when the days grew longer and the sun grew hotter, schools would close and Lin would be dropped off at Air Temple Island to spend the day. Along with Kya and Bumi, Tenzin and Lin would go on adventures big and small. They would scour the island for buried treasure, battle pirates in the harbor, save princesses, slay dragons, and scurry home just in time for lunch or, if daylight lasted long enough, they would cease their play for dinner and then return to their escapades before night settled on the island and Toph arrived to take Lin back home to Republic City.

One summer Uncle Sokka taught them all to fish. Lin and Bumi weren't much good at it—they never had the patience to stand around "doing nothing," waiting for the fish to bite—and Kya was a waterbender who failed to see how a pole, string, and hook could possibly be useful for catching fish that she could just as easily bend out of the water. Tenzin enjoyed the lessons anyway, and could be found on many early summer mornings standing at the shore after meditation, patiently waiting for a catch. Uncle Sokka joined him when he could, but he was often too busy with council work to spare the time necessary for fishing.

Years after his uncle's death, Tenzin continued his morning summer ritual, as though he was still expecting Uncle Sokka to come walking up behind him to offer a wide grin and a slight correction to his technique.

Another summer, Lin and Tenzin begged Aang to take them gliding. The avatar complied, and Lin's giddy laughter as she was taken up into the air by the wind still resounds in Tenzin's memory from time to time. On good days, the echoes of her laughter make him smile.

On bad days they only make him sick.

Because that was the summer they thought they were invincible. He was thirteen, she was twelve. The world was at their fingertips. Nothing could bring them down.

Or so they thought.

He remembers her smile. That catching, glowing smile that made his heart soar higher and higher until it reached the stratosphere. He remembers her laughter, her teasing words that were once her mother's.

"_Let's go, Twinkle-toes."_

They say it's always calmest before the storm, but Tenzin knows this isn't true. The waters were rough, that day. The sea was roaring, rearing, pitching, seething. It wasn't a storm, according to the weather report on the radio. Just a little agitation. It would pass around noon, at which time the waters would be gentle once again.

Tenzin learned the hard way never to trust the weatherman.

It was the last day of summer. The urgency that such a threshold brings was almost tangible as Tenzin and Lin tried to think of things to do with their last day to themselves. Tenzin suggested a pai sho tournament; Lin wanted to "explore" the island, as this was her favorite thing to do. Then Tenzin had gotten an idea. They would take two gliders out to the cliffs, like Aang had done with them earlier that same summer, and spend the day flying through the sky over Yue Bay. It would be the perfect ending to a perfect summer. Lin immediately agreed, and after checking the weather report, they set out for the rocky edges of the island.

When they got to the cliff Aang had taken them to the first time they went gliding, Tenzin could see the waters were a bit rougher than normal and the wind currents seemed more unstable than what would be ideal flying conditions, but Lin was giving him that teasing smirk that meant she thought he was a baby. Many times this scene would play back in his head, and Tenzin would try to find the places where he could have changed it all; where he could have prevented what came next, suggested that they back out, go home, go exploring like she wanted to do originally… If he had just turned around—faked a headache, a sour stomach, a little dizziness perhaps—he wouldn't have such debilitating nightmares of that day.

But her smirk set a fire in his heart, and he wanted so badly to hear her laughter over the roar of the wind, like he had when his father lifted her into the air. He wouldn't let the weather ruin his plans. After all, it was ten minutes to noon, judging by the height of the sun overhead, and the forecast had foretold gentle waters.

He had attached a rope to both gliders so they wouldn't be separated and he could more easily keep her glider in the air with his bending. It was difficult to support both his own glider and the one Lin had borrowed, but Tenzin was certain he could pull it off. After all, he had been told for years that he was an airbending prodigy. If his father could do it, so could he.

They walked to the edge of the cliff, gliders in hand. The wind twisted Lin's hair about her face as she looked out upon Yue Bay. Tenzin remembers that before that moment, he had never thought of his friend as being particularly beautiful. It was a shame he hadn't realized it earlier; maybe then he could have kissed her instead, innocently on her windswept cheek, and he would have had that to remember the summer by. Maybe then he would have been able to distract her long enough to bring them away from the cliff, to a safer place where they could have spent the day together.

"_Ready, Lin?" he said, smiling to hide his uncertainty._

"_I've been ready, airhead," she answered, giving him a playful shove closer to the edge of the cliff. _

"_Then let's go."_

He had lifted them into the air, riding on a current that brought them high up over the moody waters down below. For a few minutes, Tenzin managed to support them, and he had never felt more alive. Lin was laughing, just as he hoped she would. He kept their gliders close together, moving in sync with the wind. As they soared through the sky, Tenzin let loose a triumphant yell that had risen up inside him. This was flying. This was freedom. This was—

"_Tenzin?" Lin fought for her voice to be heard above the roar of the wind._

"_Yes?" It was getting more and more difficult to keep them in the air. He needed to concentrate._

"_Look!" She was trying to point ahead of them without losing her grip on the glider. "It's a storm!"_

Tenzin had looked ahead and seen that she was right; they were headed straight towards a tempest over the sea. The sky was suddenly very dark, and the wind had picked up to incredibly high speeds. He was fighting to keep the gliders under control, to turn them around and away from the swiftly approaching storm that would overtake them if he did not change their course, but his bending was no match for Mother Nature.

"_Tenzin?" Lin's voice shook. She was slipping. The wind was tearing viciously at them now, and her glider was being thrown away from his as he lost control of it completely. _

In retrospect, he sees everything quite clearly. He can see the last glimpse he got of her face—her terrified green eyes meeting his in the split second before the rope tore and her glider fell, taken away by the power of the gale. He can see her body freefalling, tumbling through the air like a ragdoll dropped from the roof of a building. He can see the roiling water, hear the raging wind in his ears, and feel the rain on his face as the scream that ripped through his throat mingled with hers.

"_Lin!" _

With only one glider to bend through the air, Tenzin managed to maneuver himself out of the worst of the storm. The rest happened in a blur. He remembers swooping down to glide just above the water, looking for any sign of Lin. The storm was still quite strong, but it was losing steam as it approached the island. He searched and searched, eyes frantically looking for an arm, a leg, a piece of clothing—anything that could let him know where she could be found—but there was nothing but a wild sea rising and falling with the biggest waves he had ever seen in Yue Bay. Panicked, he was about to give up and go seek help when he saw it: a pale hand reaching out from a dark, crushing wave before it disappeared again. Diving into the water, Tenzin sought to grasp that same pale hand, going deeper and deeper, blindly swimming down into the depths of the bay. His lungs were screaming for air and his limbs had turned to leaden weights when finally he caught hold of the tips of her delicate little fingers. Using the last of his energy, Tenzin propelled them both to the surface, legs and arms working in earnest desperation.

Breaking the surface of the water was the single greatest feeling he had ever felt in his thirteen years of life. The second was the first shaky breath of air he took, filling his lungs with as much as they could handle. Lin was in his arms—thank the spirits—but she wasn't moving. Wasn't breathing. He needed to get her to land, and fast. He used his airbending to lift them into the air, his glider lost in his haste to swim to her. He created a whirlwind in the dying gale that would return them to the cliff.

Once back on land, Tenzin practically flew back to the Air Temple compound. He found his father outside, speaking with some acolytes about the weather. When his eyes fell upon his son and the unconscious Lin in his arms, he acted on instinct. Laying the girl down, he used his bending to draw the water out of her lungs. He called to his wife as he worked, certain she knew better what needed to be done.

Tenzin has very few regrets that date all the way back to his childhood, but one that stood out in his mind years later was having caused the look of distress on his mother's face that afternoon, when she saw him soaked to the bone, pale and clammy and shaking, with Lin unconscious on the ground beside him.

She had quickly pushed her husband aside and taken over the care of the earthbender. After a few more minutes of drawing water out of the girl's lungs, Lin awoke, coughing and sputtering, rolling onto her side as her body shook.

"_Lin! Oh, thank the spirits," said Katara, who had started to fear the worst when Lin wasn't responding to her treatment._

Tenzin had been afraid before. He knew what fear felt like. Fear was cold, dark, hard, sharp, and gripping. Fear was his stomach dropping to the floor or climbing up the walls of his esophagus. Fear was getting lost in the woods on a starless night. Fear was waking up in the early hours of the morning and forgetting for a moment where and who he was.

That is why, when he watched his mother and father take a coughing, shaking Lin into the compound, he knew that he did not just merely _fear_ losing Lin.

There had been fire in his veins when he felt her slipping from the glider. There were knives in his chest when he realized he could not keep two gliders under control flying through a storm. There was acid in his eyes where salt water should have been while he swam deeper and deeper beneath the bay, reaching blindly for a hand he knew may be too far gone to be saved. He was not just simply afraid; he was _petrified_, struck numb by the possibility that the last memory he would have had of her would have been the look of horror in her eyes the moment she began to fall or the paleness of her hand disappearing among the waves of the dark and merciless sea.

That evening he remembers being grilled by his parents for the stupidity of his actions. Both he and Lin could have easily drowned and neither of his parents would have been any the wiser. Lin was lucky to have survived—luckier than she would most likely ever be again. Toph was called in the middle of her shift and told that there had been an incident of sorts involving her daughter. She was on the first boat to Air Temple Island, thundering into the compound less than thirty minutes later.

Lin's skin was ghostly pale for almost two days afterward. She came to see his mother after school to ensure no lasting damage had been done to her respiratory system. Tenzin tried to apologize to her while his mother's healing hands hovered over her lungs, but Lin never blamed him for what happened; if anything, she blamed herself for falling and needing Tenzin to save her. Lin never liked the idea that he had saved her life—it made her feel like she owed him, and Lin had always loathed the concept of being in someone's debt. She could only hope that one day she could return the favor.

To this day, Tenzin is one of the few people who know why her hands shake and her heart races when she comes too close to the water. He is the only one who understands the deep fear she has of drowning, and he is the only one she has ever told about her nightmares involving howling winds and crashing waves and falling through the air. For six months after the incident, Lin needed to be coaxed on and off the boat between Republic City and Air Temple Island, for her legs would go weak in the knee whenever she felt the rocking motion of the water beneath her.

The following summer Tenzin noticed the slight tremble of her fingers when she gathered enough courage to go down to the beach and sink her toes into the wet sand, just close enough for the water to lick at her ankles. He watched her eyes slip closed and her breath hitch as the tiny waves brought her back to the day she first began to fear the sea. It crushed Tenzin to see how profoundly that day had changed her. After all, Lin had trusted him to keep her safe, and he had failed—nearly at the cost of her life.

Summer had always been Tenzin's favorite season, but the summer of his thirteenth year permanently changed his mind. The next time he asked Lin to go gliding, he was seventeen and there was not a single cloud in the sky…

And it was autumn.


	13. Cured

A/N: I have no time to write anymore, but I will try my best to keep updating. I hope you like this rather dark look into the relationship between Lin's mother and father. There's also a little Linzin at the end. Could be possibly upsetting for those who have known someone who has suffered from tuberculosis. I most certainly do not own the Legend of Korra.

_**Cured**_

There are days when she remembers everything; the dismal weather, the soaked clothing, the words said and shouted and whispered and lost and forgotten…

It's days like these—when the brooding sky weeps and the Spirits rage with fits of thunder and lightning—when Lin's memory clings to the last (and _only_) memory she has of her father.

It was raining, when he came; drenched, ragged, and as wayward as the day he left. Toph had a habit of liking those who were far too free-spirited for their own good. This man was not one to dwell in one place for long. When the winds changed, he was gone—a summer breeze taking its leave before a storm. He never wanted children, never needed a steady family, a stable home or a settled life. He would rather do as he pleased and scrape by off the generosity (or rather the _stupidity_) of others. He was a cunning man whose sharp wit and blunt sense of humor appealed to Toph's more human side.

Life was certainly never dull with him around. He was always getting into trouble—he never could hold his tongue or his liquor—but he was an easy man to fall in love with when his voice softened and his gentle touch lingered.

But those are the things one tends to forget when the pains of labor and motherhood begin. And the early hours of the morning are spent changing diapers and listening to an infant scream. And later, when the toddler is always getting into trouble and making a mess and ruining the peace and quiet. In those days, Toph told herself to forget the man entirely, but how could she when the only miracle she had ever had a hand in making was also his…?

He came back once.

Just once.

Lin was four. Or five. She can't remember which.

And it was cold. And it was raining.

And she was scared.

Because this, this was not what a father was supposed to be.

He came in the evening, when the storm was at its strongest. He came with lightning and thunder on his heels, rain in his long and matted hair. He came with whisky on his breath and apologies on his tongue. He came to ask forgiveness. He came to have a home. He came to be a father.

But what he really came to do, was die.

Because he was sick—oh so very, very sick. And he had no place to go, no place to perish in peace and comfort. When he coughed, blood and rain splattered the carpet. Lin remembers her mother dressed all in black, scrubbing away the stains with a passion she never before had had for cleaning.

Sickness and death do that to a home—make it feel as though it will never be clean again.

Lin tried to comfort the man in his last hours; she let him pet her hair as if she were a polar bear dog, let him hold her, let him squeeze her hand when his coughing fits began. When he would spit out the blood into a pot that she had brought to him, Lin could taste the copper and iron on her tongue as though _she_ were the one who was dying.

The whole time her father laid there, on the couch of Toph's apartment, the chief of police hardly moved a muscle. She sank shakily into an armchair, listening to the man babble incoherently about how sorry he was to have left and how he'd never leave again. Once, she feebly raised her voice to ask if he knew what illness plagued him.

The babbling stopped. Hollowed sockets housing sunken eyes locked into her unseeing gaze and he started, as though he had forgotten she was blind. Lin looked between the two as her little hand slipped from her father's grasp.

"The Red Death."

Toph knew of this disease. Republic City had had a mild winter, and so viruses and bacteria had been given the chance to grow, to multiply, to spread. Many had fallen ill in the past few months, and there was very little the hospitals and healers of the city could do to help those who were suffering. Consumption was nothing to sniff at—it was lethal. And contagious.

"Lin, come away from him. He's sick."

Lin looked from her father's ghastly face to her mother's pained expression.

"Don't take her away! She's all I have left!" the man wailed, resuming his rambling before his voice lost strength and dissolved into another fit of coughing.

Feeling tears prick behind her eyes at the sound of her father's hacking coughs, Lin shook her head at her mother. "I don't want to go! I won't leave him!"

The babbling stopped once more. A bony hand reached out for hers, but Toph moved faster. Scooping her daughter up into her arms, the metalbender said coldly, "_He_ left us. He left _you_, Lin. And now, you have to leave him too. He's dying, Lin, and his germs are just as deadly. You need to get away from him."

Kicking and screaming, Lin pleaded with her mother to let her stay with the poor man she now knew to be her father, but Toph had turned to stone. Without responding to her daughter's pleas, she locked the girl in her room with her earthbending. Her daughter's health was her first priority.

She sent a message to Katara, requesting medical assistance. Toph was no fool; she knew there was nothing Katara would be able to do for him, but it would ease her mind to have an expert on illness and healing take a look at the man she once claimed to love.

In the time it took for Katara to travel through the storm, Toph stood in her living room, feeling the ailing man's weak heartbeat stagger on. His terrible coughing fits tore at her nerves, at her heart—destroying walls she had built up over the years of his absence—until she thought she might just go insane. That's when Katara arrived, soaking wet and out of breath, ready to help in whatever way she could.

The waterbender was surprised, to say the least, when she found out that it was not Toph or Lin who needed her, but Lin's father, whom she had neither seen nor heard from in years. She asked no questions, in the fashion of a healer who knew better than to poke harshly around wound sites, and proceeded to examine the man Toph hadn't spoken to in nearly six years.

It was short, simple work. Upon inspection, Katara found that his lungs were diseased beyond treatment. Looking over at her silent friend, who hadn't so much as moved since she came in, the wife of the avatar could not help but feel her stomach clench at the sight. Toph was standing very still, facing in her direction but clearly unaware of what was going on around her.

Faintly, Katara could hear banging coming from down a hallway to the right.

Toph turned her head. "That's Lin. I didn't want her getting sick."

The banging was growing louder. Katara's patient coughed once, weakly. His brow was furrowed with pain, his skin ashen white, his body emaciated from an apparently long, onerous battle against a terminal illness. Katara had never in her life imagined that she would feel sorry for the man who abandoned Toph three months into her pregnancy…

"Katara?" Toph's voice was lacking its usual steely strength. "Wouldn't it be better if…we ended his suffering now?"

Katara's eyes drifted between the chief of police and her former partner, who was no longer conscious. He had slipped into a deep sleep; the dreamless kind that offers a bit of solace to a besieged soul. He was a goner, for sure, but there is a sizable difference between natural death and euthanasia.

"Are you sure you want to have that sort of deed on your conscience? Taking a life is…well…"

"He told me once he'd rather die than live in pain." Toph's expression was unreadable, her voice reflecting her unfathomable thoughts as she said, "That's why he came here. He knew I'd do it."

Shocked, Katara could not stop the gasp before it left her throat. "H-He wants you to_ kill_ him?"

Walking over, Toph stood beside Katara, her scarred hands clenching and unclenching into fists. "When we began seeing each other, we made a promise that if either of us was ever hurt beyond recovery, we'd pull the plug. Quick. Easy. Painless. No life support, no resuscitation, no nonsense."

Katara was silent for a moment before she countered quietly, "Having hope isn't nonsense. If there's a chance of survival, most people would like to wait and see. It never hurts to have a little faith—"

"No, it hurts like hell." Toph was speaking in a heavily weighted, measured tone, as though at any moment her voice would break under the strain, "You watch, and wait, and you pray the Spirits let them live. Well I've done my fair share of waiting and listening, Katara, and let me tell you—the Spirits don't give a damn who lives or dies unless you're the Avatar."

Her words stung Katara like a slap across the face or a crack of a whip, for beneath them she could sense years of hidden resentment and animosity. Toph had had many close calls during the war and after, but she had never once mentioned that she envied Aang's connection to the Spirit World.

Switching topics quickly, Toph said, "Do you mind checking on Lin? She sounds like she's about to break down the door."

Indeed, the banging noises had grown even louder than before, but Katara was hesitant to allow her friend to go through with what she was planning to do.

"Toph—"

"Please, Katara," Toph was reaching for her metal cables in the corner. "Go."

* * *

Lin was sobbing uncontrollably when Katara broke through Toph's extra restraints on her bedroom door. Entering and closing the door behind her, the mother of three sat wearily down beside the little brown-haired girl who was curled up in a ball on the floor. Placing a hand on Lin's shoulder, Katara whispered soothing words that held very little meaning even to her own much older and wiser ears. Eventually she picked up the child, brought her over to the bed, and sat down with her in her lap, allowing the girl to sob into her chest. Lin had found her father and lost him in one afternoon. She had a right to cry.

And, if Katara was honest with herself, quite a few tears slipped from her own eyes when she heard Toph's metal cables drop to the floor, the deed done.

* * *

When Lin considers her life from afar, detached from its every day trajectory, she feels as though she went directly from the cradle to the casket. From cotton swaddling to black shrouds. One day she was learning to walk. The next—or what seemed like the next, but was years instead of days—she was watching her mother slip the sleeves of a plain black dress over her shoulders.

The funeral was small. Very small. In fact, the only mourners besides Lin and her mother were Aang, Katara, and their children. Uncle Sokka was off on business in the Earth Kingdom, and Toph doubted he would have wanted to come to begin with—he never approved of her choice of partner.

Lin stood beside Tenzin, trying her best not to cry for the man she hardly knew and yet feeling as though she ought to mourn the death of her father, just on principal. When they lowered him into the ground, Tenzin grabbed her hand and squeezed it. He didn't know why or how this all happened—how her father had returned, only to die—but he knew that it was upsetting his best friend. Her little fingers gripped his, and they stood together up until it started to rain.

Lin was hardly five years old, and yet, she knew that rain was not just precipitation falling from the sky. It was the tears she wasn't allowed to cry. It was the tears her mother never let drop to the pavement, even when she was the only one who truly knew the man they laid to rest that day. A chapter of Lin's life had opened and closed in less than three days, with the rain serving as a bookend to either side.

The brevity of life is astounding.

When Lin saw the way her mother carried on in the next few weeks as though nothing had happened, she thought perhaps that something was wrong. She never mentioned the man again, never even said his name in passing. Lin wondered if her mother was sick—she was so silent, so reserved, so much less likely to smile and laugh and tell her bedtime stories. Lin wondered if her mother's sickness was contagious. She asked Aunt Katara once, who said that what her mother was dealing with, was "grief." Not exactly an illness, but still quite powerful.

Lin asked if her mother could be cured.

Katara said she could.

How?

With love.


	14. Smile

A/N: sorry but I've been having a great deal of trouble posting this chapter. It says I posted it, but then it isn't showing up. Has this ever happened to anyone else? Anyway, thanks for all the support. I hope you like this new chapter. It made me smile, so I hope it makes you smile too. I don't own the Legend of Korra.

_**Smile**_

"Does that woman ever smile?"

Tenzin was taking a break between council meetings to get a bite to eat at a local vegetarian restaurant when these words cut through the quiet conversation he had been having with the old woman sitting at the table beside his.

"Think about it. Have you ever _seen_ her smile? She's always scowling. She's practically snarling at the camera!"

Tenzin turned around to see two men sitting a few tables behind him to his left, a newspaper held between them. The man speaking was pointing dramatically at the picture on the front page, trying to convince the gentleman sitting across from him that his words were true.

"You wouldn't smile either if you had to deal with the city's worst crime lords on a daily basis," came the other man's response. He was the older of the two, with a few lines marking his years and experience around his eyes and mouth. As Tenzin watched, he grabbed the newspaper with the hand that was not currently occupied by a steaming mug of chai tea and began scanning the article beneath the photo.

"Says here she's taken out twelve of the city's worst triads in only a year's time. That's impressive, that is," the man mused, sipping at his tea thoughtfully.

"But look at her expression! She looks ready to murder the photographer," the younger man continued his previous argument, clearly uninterested in the chief's accomplishments.

The old woman beside Tenzin had a newspaper as well, so Tenzin politely asked if she was done with it. She smiled and handed it to him with the air of a grandmother doting on her grandchild, and Tenzin couldn't help but offer a smile in return.

There on the front page, standing stiffly in the new metalbending police uniform that she had redesigned herself, was Lin Bei Fong. Her eyes were looking sharply out into the world, her lips set in such a way as to make her appear menacing. Tenzin new she did this on purpose, to prove to the public that she was not weak—that she was to be feared and respected, not underestimated or manipulated—but he had to admit that the picture was a bit disconcerting.

Leaving money on the table to cover his meager lunch of overcooked vegetables, Tenzin said goodbye to the elderly woman, thanked her for the newspaper, and left the restaurant.

Once outside, Tenzin tucked the newspaper under his arm as he weaved his way through the bustling streets of downtown Republic City. Quite a few friendly faces stopped him to exchange polite conversation or to bow respectfully to him before carrying on with their day. Checking the time with an influential businessman who had stopped to say hello, Tenzin found that he would need to hurry if he was going to keep his appointment.

He arrived in the park just as the sun reached its pinnacle in the sky. He sat on a bench near the river, observing a mother and her child feeding small pieces of bread to a family of turtle-ducks. Tenzin smiled to himself as the little girl, who couldn't be a day older than three, flung the bread crumbs up wildly—some falling into the water, others flying in every direction _but_ the one she intended—hardly bending her elbow at all. The mother laughed good-naturedly as several crumbs wound up in the girl's hair and all over her forest-green dress. Kneeling beside her daughter, she began picking the crumbs out of the toddler's short brown curls as the girl gleefully babbled, gesticulating excitedly in the direction of the turtle-ducks.

It was then when Lin arrived, coming up behind Tenzin with a quietness that never failed to astound him, considering her metal uniform. She sat down on the bench beside him, following his gaze to where the little brown-haired girl was jumping up and down, begging her mother for more bread crumbs.

"How was your morning?" said Tenzin, noticing Lin's hands tense up at the sound of the little girl's shrieking laughter when a baby turtle-duck came right up to her, eating from the palm of her hand.

Lin sighed the world-weary sigh of someone twice her age. At twenty-three, she was still a young woman, yet her eyes were old and worn. They'd witnessed more than their fair share of tragedy, and she was tired. She had far too much weighing on her heart and mind for someone so young. He could relate.

"That bad, huh?"

She remained silent as the little girl was distracted by a patch of flowers close to the river's edge. Brown curls bouncing up and down, the toddler ran to them and began picking a small bouquet of white, orange, and yellow lilies, laughing all the while the unaffected, trouble-free laughter that is unique to children.

Tenzin was suddenly struck by a memory. "Lin?"

His companion's eyes drifted towards his. "I remember when _you_ were that little," he nodded in the girl's direction. "You had a laugh just like hers. It always used to make me smile."

Lin seemed uncomfortable with this observation. Something about children had always unsettled her, and Tenzin never quite understood why.

"Yet," he continued, pulling out the newspaper that was still tucked under his arm and unfolding it, "I see this picture, and it's shocking to think how much time has passed since then…"

He showed her the article. With her own face glaring back at her, Lin seemed almost unable to recognize the person in the photo. Tenzin felt his stomach clench a bit as she took the newspaper into her own hands. He didn't like the way her eyes darkened and her lips turned down at the edges into a frown. She seemed just as lost looking at that photo as he felt whenever he found himself looking into a mirror. They had both grown into adults beyond recognition to their former selves. Was that _really_ the image of his childhood friend printed in the paper, scowling at the world in varying shades of gray?

"'Scuse me," Tenzin felt a tug on his robes. There at his feet, the little girl stood, pudgy fingers entangling themselves in the layers of red and yellow fabric. Her large, round brown eyes gazed up at him through wayward curls falling into her line of sight, her other hand clutching an orange lily tightly in her fist.

"Yes?" Tenzin leaned down, placing a gentle hand on the toddler's head. Lin watched them warily, the forgotten newspaper laying in her lap.

The girl's mother stood a few feet away, smiling widely at the three of them. Her smile faltered, however, when she heard her daughter's next words.

"Where's all your hair gone?"

Having not expected this question, Tenzin sputtered as he tried to find an answer, lifting his hand off the girl's head. Beside him, Lin could not help the laughter that tumbled from her lips despite her best efforts to keep it inside.

The little girl's eyes turned to her as she let go of Tenzin's robes. With admirable speed and dexterity for a toddler, the girl climbed into Lin's lap, kicking the newspaper to the ground in the process. Shocked, uncertain what to do, Lin looked from Tenzin to the child, begging Tenzin to do something. _Get this child off me_, her eyes screamed. Tenzin just looked on in baffled amusement, offering no help whatsoever.

"You're pretty!" said the girl, sticky fingers tangling into Lin's shoulder-length brown hair. "I picked this flower for you, 'cause it's pretty too!" The girl then proceeded to stick the orange lily behind Lin's ear. "There!"

The girl's mother, seemingly aware of Lin's discomfort with the child on top of her, beckoned the girl away. Picking the girl up and swinging her onto her hip, the mother apologized for her daughter as they left.

"Bye bald man! Bye pretty lady!" The girl waved animatedly as her mother carried her away. Tenzin lifted a hand in farewell, trying not to laugh at the look of bewilderment that was still present on Lin's face.

Getting up, he offered Lin his hand. "Would the pretty lady like an escort back to police headquarters?" he teased, pleased with himself when she blushed a bit and took his hand. They walked away, hand in hand, the newspaper with its glowering photo forgotten beneath the bench.

As they walked, Tenzin caught Lin's eye and reached out his fingers to touch the flower in her hair. "It _is_ pretty." He left his meaning of the word "it" hanging, so she could interpret it as she wanted.

Lin turned her face away, but not before he caught what she was trying to hide from him.

A smile.


	15. Sunrise

A/N: I do not own Legend of Korra. Thanks again for the reviews, everyone. I really hope you enjoy this next chapter. It has a bit of the same themes as my other story, _**Left Behind**_. Check it out if you have the time. It takes place with a different timeline of events, but it has the same sort of feeling as this current chapter. The idea of being "left behind" is something I enjoy writing about. I don't quite know why. Anyway, enjoy!

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_**Sunrise**_

Tenzin spent many nights during his teenage years lying awake in his bed, listening to the sounds of the slumbering island and willing his body to sleep. Crickets would chirp, leaves would rustle…but even with nature's lullaby all around him, sleep would refuse to come.

It was on one such night that Tenzin decided to take a walk. The crispness of the autumn air settled his mind as his bare feet brought him in a meandering path down to the beach. The foul smell of low tide turned his stomach, but he dug his toes into the sand anyway and stared out at the city lights that shone in the distance, seemingly a world away, letting the tension in his shoulders slip into the sea.

Lately the daily affairs of life had become overwhelming for the young airbender due to the preparations that were being made for his seventeenth birthday. The difficulty of his training had increased enormously. His mother was on a cleaning rampage; his father was planning a spectacular _bon voyage_ celebration. Aang intended to take his son on a yearlong journey before he received his tattoos, so that he may see the ruins and relics of the culture to which he belonged. While Tenzin was glad that he would finally see the sights he had dreamt of seeing his entire life, there was a timid, plaintive voice speaking from his heart that bound him to the only home he had ever known. The life of a wanderer did not appeal to him as much as it should, seeing as his culture was by nature heavily rooted in the values of the nomadic lifestyle.

Tenzin closed his eyes. Surely, if only he could stay here forever with the gentle breeze coming off the sea pulling at his robes, he could stop time in its tracks. While he knew, realistically speaking, that it could be a few more weeks after his birthday before his father would be able to leave the council, he felt as though the adding of a seventeenth candle to the moon cakes Uncle Sokka always made for his birthday would seem final; as though the door to his childhood was slamming shut right before his eyes.

Weakly, Tenzin put a hand on his forehead, trying to stop his spinning thoughts. Three days. Just three days. What was he going to do? He still had so much to learn. His seventeenth birthday was supposed to mark his transition from boy to man, but what if he wasn't ready? He certainly didn't feel like a man, climbing out of bed in the wee hours of the morning just to stand on the shore of Yue Bay like some poor lost soul.

The wind shifted. The tide was coming in. Daybreak was perhaps an hour or two away. And still Tenzin stood a few feet from the water, eyes unfocused, body stiff and aching from lack of sleep. Eventually he decided to get started on the morning's meditation, but just as he was taking one last look at the distant majesty of Republic City, a quiet voice came from behind him.

"Come to watch the sunrise, Twinkletoes?"

He jumped. The voice laughed lightly, breaking through the serenity of the beach's atmosphere. Lin was standing a few feet behind him, green eyes twinkling as she laughed. She came to stand beside him, giving him a light push to his shoulder.

"Pondering your position in the universe?" She was still smiling, but it no longer reached her eyes. She knew he hadn't been sleeping well lately; she could feel his footsteps leave the compound night after night as she lay awake in her own bed, unable to sleep herself.

Tenzin didn't answer. His heart was still beating a bit too quickly after being surprised by her sudden presence on the beach. Why hadn't he heard her coming?

"What are you doing up at this hour?" he said, his words coming out more harshly than he intended. He sounded like a father admonishing a belligerent child.

Lin feigned a look of righteous indignation, as though she were hurt by his abrasiveness. "What? Are earthbenders forbidden from early rising? I may not enjoy meditation, but a nice quiet walk along the beach…" Lin's words drifted off, grinning at the sentimentality those words implied.

Tenzin looked away, fighting a smile of his own. He didn't want to be happy right now. He had to figure out how he was going to explain to his father that he wasn't ready to leave Air Temple Island.

"Come on, Airhead. Stop that buzzing mind of yours and take a walk with me." She was pulling on his sleeve in a childish manner that was meant to make him laugh, but he wasn't in the mood. "Please?"

Meeting her gaze, Tenzin considered declining her offer so he could continue his brooding in solitude, but she had that determined glint in her eyes that he had come to both hate and love over the years of their friendship. Nodding, he let her tug him along with her as they walked close to the water's edge.

They were silent for a long while, just appreciating each other's company as the darkness of the night grew into the paler shades of morning. The sun had yet to show itself, but the lightening horizon was ready for its arrival. Tenzin was surprised to find himself relaxing in Lin's presence, as though merely having her beside him was the best cure for all his doubts. She had always been the only person he felt could understand him; she knew him better than even his mother, who was always prying into things she shouldn't. Lin had an easiness about her, a simple sort of elegance that was rarely found in sixteen-year-old earthbenders, to be sure. She knew when to tease and when to comfort, while his mother and father only really knew when to discipline and when to guide.

Lin was his consolation. Her friendship kept him sane when the pressure of having his unique abilities became too much for him to handle. No matter what he did wrong or right, she was always beside him, offering encouragement in the midst of her playful jibes at his lack of skill. He could trust her to be honest with him, whereas others always fawned over his abilities, exclaiming that he was unbelievably talented at so young an age.

It's easy to be the best when you have no competition.

They had been walking for quite some time before Lin finally broke the silence. "It'll be great, you know. Traveling. Seeing the world…"

She was looking out at the sea, speaking as if she were addressing the sun that was just about to lift itself up onto the horizon. Tenzin could only see the profile of her face, her brown hair falling in waves down her back. She had grown it out this past year, and Tenzin could not help but notice that she was becoming quite a beautiful young lady.

"You'll meet all sorts of interesting people, I'm sure. And you'll get to spend lots of time with your father," she was trying to remind him that he should consider the trip an adventure, not a banishment. He appreciated her effort, but all it did was make him more aware of the fact that home was not the only thing he was leaving; he was also leaving_ her_.

"Lin?" he asked, coming to a stop as they reached a more rocky side of the beach. He waited for her to stop and look at him. She did, if a bit uncertainly. He could see now that in her eyes were all the words she did not want him to hear her say, as though saying them would make the parting all the more real.

Softly, he said what had been sitting on his tongue for months, "I don't want to go."

Her eyes darted to the side, breaking away from his gaze. She brought her hands up to hug her arms closer to her as the sea breeze sent a chill up her spine. "I know," she said as she turned away from him. Her voice had lost its usual strength. It was quiet, almost melancholy. "But think of how wonderful it will feel to be a master. You've worked all your life to earn your tattoos. A year is nothing compared to the honor of being an airbending master."

Something in Lin's voice made him move a few steps closer and place a hand on her shoulder. She almost shrugged it off, but with only a short time left for her to be near to him, she let it stay. When she didn't move away from him, Tenzin asked another question that had been burning inside him for days.

"Will you be all right here, all alone with my mother?"

The question hung uncomfortably in the air for a bit before Lin's response struck it mercilessly down. "Of course I will. Why wouldn't I be?" Lin tried to spit the words, as though she was revolted by their very taste, but Tenzin could hear the truth. "Don't worry about me, Airhead. You need to focus on mastering airbending. This trip is your chance to prove to everyone that you aren't just your father's shadow; you'll essentially be his _equal_ by the time you turn eighteen."

She gave him a shove for good measure, still trying to distract him from his thoughts of her situation. It worked. He smiled and shoved her back with a laugh.

The sun was finally in full rise, and it was breathtakingly beautiful. They both turned to face it, eyes going wide with wonder. Red, orange, and yellow painted the sky, stretching across the horizon. Spellbound, they watched the sky change colors in silence until Lin caught Tenzin's eyes wandering to her own. She realized then that the space that had previously been between them was gone. He reached up to touch her cheek, looking at the sunrise reflected in her eyes and wishing it would never leave them. She placed a hand over his, feeling its warmth chase away her earlier chill.

Tenzin moved even closer, placing a soft, hesitant kiss against her lips. It was only the second time he had dared to do it; the first had been at sunset on his fifteenth birthday, and he had been feeling lucky. (Luckier still when she hadn't punched him for it, as he had expected her to). In two years, a great deal had changed, and he hadn't had the brazen courage to try to turn their friendship into something more. But now, faced with the prospect of not seeing her for an entire year, he could not help but let his heart overpower all the misgivings in his mind.

Lin accepted his kiss, feeling all at once like she was flying and falling. When he deepened the kiss, she lost all care for particulars; whether flying or falling, she was in Tenzin's arms. He would save her.

Wrapped in an embrace, they welcomed dawn. He may be leaving, but not yet. Not yet.


	16. Contamination

A/N: I do not own Legend of Korra. This piece was inspired by John Ritter's song, "The Curse." Listen to it if you can. It's lovely. And "amare languorem" means "love sickness" in latin.

_**Contamination**_

Some say love is a gift. It descends, gracefully, joyously, onto those who find peace in another's arms. It settles in and makes a home out of the valves and ventricles that pump life-blood through the heart. Once situated, it does not leave. It languishes in the chambers, dances up the aorta, swims in the blood, and listens to the lullaby of the beating heart until it is lulled to sleep.

But love is not a gift. It is an infestation.

Tenzin was only supposed to be gone for a few hours in the afternoon. He was supposed to check on the progress of the air acolytes, ensure all was well now that both his mother and father were gone from the island. He would be back by four, he told Lin. He would bring home a nice vegetarian meal for them both. It would be a lovely dinner, a pleasant Friday night spent together. With their busy schedules always in conflict, it was rare for them to have time for one another. It would be a special evening for them both.

Plans go astray. The infestation spreads.

Pema was born into the air acolyte culture; she never knew any other life. Tenzin was her teacher, her master, her inspiration. He was the reason she would never leave Air Temple Island, even if she wanted to. She had admired him as a child and as she grew, the admiration had grown into lasting devotion. Her fellow acolytes never used the word "obsession," but as a teenager Pema was certain they had all believed her fixation on the much older son of the avatar to be almost unhealthy. Never once did they consider that perhaps she was afflicted—contaminated, really—by a disease so common many forget its lethality: _amare languorem_

That afternoon, after making his rounds around the island, Tenzin entered the kitchen where Pema was cooking dinner. At twenty-two, she was no longer a love-struck teenager, but her heart still sped up at the sight of him approaching her and the stew she had been carrying from the counter to the stove slipped through her thin fingers. Carrots, beans, tomatoes, and peppers flew in all directions, splattering her robes, the floor, the counter, and to her horror, Tenzin's robes as well. Face flushed, Pema apologized profusely, but Tenzin just laughed good-naturedly and offered to help her clean it up.

"How are you, Pema?" he asked as he grabbed a towel and started wiping down the faces of the cabinets. "You're on kitchen duty this week, I gather."

Pema's face was the shade of the tomatoes she was currently removing from her robes. "Y-Yes, Master Tenzin. I'm so sorry, your robes—"

"What, these?" Tenzin's empty hand waved at his clothes while his other hand extricated bits of potato from a pitcher of ice tea that was steeping on the counter. "These are old. Hardly fit for wearing anymore. In fact, I should be thanking you. Now I have a reason to get new ones."

Tenzin laughed again and Pema's stomach fluttered. She silently retrieved a mop from a small closet near the back door, willing her pulse to return to normal. Tenzin watched her go as he brought the vegetables in his hands over to the garbage. When she gracefully bent to take the mop into her gentle hands he could not help but notice the way her awkward teenage body had grown into that of stunning young woman.

"How are you faring in your studies, Pema?" Tenzin asked conversationally, trying to take his mind off of his prior thoughts.

Pema's blush was slowly receding as she became more comfortable. "I'm doing well, thank you. Sifu says I'll be ready to work in the temple soon."

Tenzin made a sound of approval in the back of his throat. "That's wonderful. I'm proud of your progress, Pema."

Pema stopped mopping, shy eyes lifting up to meet his. "Thank you, Master Tenzin," she said, wishing she could tell him just how much his support truly meant to her, but she suspected he already knew if the softness of his gaze and the sincerity in his voice were any indication.

Cleaning the kitchen was a timely endeavor, but they carried on a pleasant conversation all the while. There was so much and so little to discuss that Pema was surprised that she had never spoken to him like this before; their conversation felt natural, as if they were old friends who never grew tired of hearing each other's voices.

When they were through, Tenzin did not seem ready to leave. He paused on his way out the door.

"Would you like me to stay to help you make another stew? It would be a shame for you to have worked so long in this kitchen with nothing to show for it," Tenzin did not feel guilty as he said it, but when Pema looked at him with such captivation and gratitude, he felt an uncomfortable tug somewhere in his chest. He was supposed to be back in Republic City hours ago. Lin was waiting for him at her apartment, expecting him for dinner.

Pushing all thoughts of obligation and punctuality aside, Tenzin spread the ingredients for another stew on the counter as Pema retrieved a cutting board. She smiled at him as she passed him a knife and he could not stop the smile that he gave her in return. He could almost hear the flutter of her heart and feel the electricity that shot up her arm at his brief touch when he asked for the peeler to her right. Her eyes glittered with delight as they continued talking as if he had never planned to leave at all. Her youthful face would turn to his with a smile so bright it could only belong to someone who had not lived long enough to know the horrors of this world.

She was too young. He should not be indulging her fancy.

But her touch was soft and his heart was sore. His relationship with Lin had been troubled lately, and he was aching for the companionship that Pema offered him.

This was wrong. He could feel the wrongness of it even as he laughed at Pema's soft spoken humor between adding more cups of vegetables to the stew.

When finally the stew was set to cook on the stove top, the sun was already setting. Suddenly sober, the joy that had risen in Tenzin's heart started to deflate. Pema seemed affected by the dwindling daylight as well. She was withdrawing from him, aware that somewhere within those past hours she had crossed a line and so had he. However innocent their conversation, the looks and the smiles that passed between them were too charged, too meaningful, too expectant. They were dancing around an unspoken mutual attraction that was entirely inappropriate, considering their positions as teacher and student.

And yet, the disease had found purchase in his flesh. It was poisoning his blood even as they exchanged curt goodbyes. It was a curse whispered by some spirit from on high. The curse followed him as he took to the wind, soaring through the dying sunlight on his glider.

When finally he arrived at the apartment he shared with Lin, she was waiting for him in the sitting room. She lifted her eyebrows as he came in, silently appraising his stained robes and guilty expression.

When he spoke, his voice told nothing of his discomfort. "I'm sorry I'm late, Lin. There was an accident in the kitchen that I helped clean up. You know how messy stews can be," he gestured to the stains, covering his shame with a convincing smile. "You should have been there. You would have loved watching me make an attempt at cooking. It was laughable, really."

He walked over to her, offering an embrace that she accepted, if a bit unwillingly. She spoke into his chest, "Why didn't you let the air acolytes handle it? Spirits know you can't even boil water without burning something." She was teasing him, but it was clear she wanted an answer. Why did he stay so late when he had plans to spend the evening with her? She said as much.

"What on earth kept you there so long?" Her solemn green eyes were seeking the truth in his.

Tenzin kissed her. It was all he could think to do.

"Sorry, love," he spoke breathlessly between kisses. The contamination was coursing through his veins, entering his heart. It felt like a scalpel slicing through his pericardium. It felt like a plague and a knife and a deformity all at once. The poor muscle whimpered first in pain, next in defiance, and then in defeat.

He kissed her, praying she would forget the question.


	17. Invitation

A/N: I do not own Legend of Korra. Sorry for the delay! I have no time, no time at all in which to write…but here is my take on the issue of Tenzin and Pema's marriage.

_**Invitation **_

Lin never hated the girl.

She was a pretty little thing with a gracious smile and a pleasant demeanor. She was warm, loving, and sickeningly sweet. She was a soft type of beautiful; a beautiful that one grows to appreciate upon a second or third glance, but only when the lighting is right. She was patient, she was calm. She was the sort of girl you imagined would be a good wife one day. A good mother.

Lin never hated her, because she could never legitimize the hatred, even in her own mind.

Pema certainly had nothing to hide. She was no killer. She had never bargained with crime lords, never sought revenge, never soiled her hands in the heat of combat. Pema's life was safe, certain, and predictable. There were no surprises, no corpses to clean up or secrets to be buried. No tears to shed over scars or lives lost on her watch. Pema did not have a history drenched in blood.

The same could not be said for Lin, and Tenzin had always loathed the sight of blood.

Lin doesn't blame him. Not anymore, anyway. Nowadays, when she tries to speak to him, she tastes copper and iron on her tongue—too familiar, too potent. She closes her mouth, conscious of the metallic liquid that slips down the back of her throat.

She sees pictures and articles in the newspaper. _The Last Airbender—Engaged!_ Lately she has taken to only reading the column on the weather, bypassing the sections where she is likely to find news of her former partner. She doesn't want to see his face beaming up at her in black and white, mocking her. Lin wonders if the reporters do it on purpose; if they deliberately choose the photos and words in their articles with the intention of making her spill her daily morning coffee.

Pictures never lie. The truth stares up at her, confident, comfortable, and undeniably _there_. He was happy. He was in love. He did not need Lin in his life. He had a fiancé. What use was she to him as a former…what? What exactly was she? What did she mean to him?

When she receives the invitation, it is immediately shoved under a pile of police reports on her kitchen counter. She does not open it. She knows as much as she needs to know by the dainty cursive on the front:

_To Ms. Lin Bei Fong_

_51 Kyoshi Road, Republic City_

Lin resents the way Pema elaborately loops the "L" in her first name, as if the girl can't stand for anything less than beautiful, even in her penmanship. The ink glimmers on the front of the envelope, catching the light of her lamp as she contemplates "accidently" throwing it in the fire. She would love nothing more than to watch the flames curl its edges, blacken the words, erase the proof of how terribly wrong things have turned out.

Instead, it remains beneath the scores of police reports on her kitchen counter where she can pretend it doesn't exist.

If there is a RSVP date, she will never know, because she refuses to open it. She isn't going. She won't willingly put herself in the company of the people who used to be her family by all connections but blood. She won't force a smile at the temple, won't mingle with the guests, won't show support for her old friend and his new wife. She knows it's petty, but some wounds never completely heal, and her ugly, jagged scars would be put on display for everyone in attendance if she were to go. She doesn't need the pity they will evoke, doesn't need the knowing glances and the strained silences. She had him for over twenty years before she lost him, and most of the guests will be well aware of that sorry truth. As much as she would like to think that she has moved passed it all, there are residual pains that make such things impossible to ignore.

As the wedding draws closer, journalists and news reporters alike shove their tape recorders in her face, asking how she feels about the last airbender's impending marriage. They want her to say she hates them both. They want some scathing remark, some disparaging comment that will make for a good headline. Lin digs in her heart for any hatred residing within…

She comes up empty.

There is no hatred, only a vague sense of loss. She turns the reporters away, never giving them what they want to hear. Because the truth is, Pema is not a bad person. Any libel Lin could spread about her, any criticism of the age difference or the suddenness of the proposal—it all would be worthless. It would cause a stir, certainly, but to what purpose? Why drag a good woman's reputation through the mud? Lin may not be particularly fond of the girl, but she was above the pettiness that the media wished to instigate.

After all, Lin had not_ planned_ to arrest Pema back when the wounds of the breakup were fresh and the pain was sharp, but the circumstantial evidence was too strong to ignore. Pema was seen coming out of a tea shop just as a Triad group began to plunder the place. She was the only one involved in the whole ordeal who left the shop unscathed. Lin arrested her under suspicions of collaboration with the triads, though she knew this was highly unlikely. The law was the law, however, and all those discovered at the scene of a crime needed to be properly detained and questioned.

She had never seen Tenzin so angry in her life, when he came to retrieve Pema. He was livid as he ordered her to release the girl. Lin's eyes turned to steel, her heart frozen as she explained coldly that Pema's background was still under investigation and as such, she could not leave. The fight that ensued between the two former friends was the talk of the city for weeks afterward, word traveling quickly that the Chief of Police had arrested an air acolyte on questionable charges.

That was all over and done with now, however. The charges were dropped, as Lin knew they would be. Pema was released, and the incident was eventually forgotten.

Lin knows the wedding is right around the corner when the people of Republic City can speak of nothing else. Still, Lin's invitation remains beneath piles of paperwork. The seal has not been broken. She wants to bury the whole affair, but a day before the wedding, she is called upon by the only two people in the world capable of changing her mind.

First it was Bumi, on leave from the United Forces for the occasion. He pounded on her door for twenty minutes as dusk settled over the city before Lin finally accepted that he would not go away.

"Come on, Bei Fong, I know you're in there! Open up!" More banging, with some colorful phrases added to the beat.

"Oh _all right_. Just stop trying to break down my door." Lin opened it with an air of irritation and defeat, turning around before she even had the chance to meet his eyes.

"It's about time." Bumi ambled into her apartment, watching as she immediately went to put the kettle on to boil, though she knew as well as anyone that Bumi has never much cared for tea. Her movements were stiff, mechanical, and he had to stop himself from wondering if beneath it all, she was still the scrawny little girl that he remembered from his youth. He made himself at home on her couch, propping his feet up on the coffee table.

As she waited for the water to boil, Lin took the seat opposite him in a rocking chair he knew had belonged to her mother. It was of a solid wooden design, not much to look at, but as Toph's daughter, Lin had never paid much attention to appearances. She was wearing a light brown tunic and matching, loose-fitting pants that seemed a few sizes too large. He wondered if she bought them like that, because the alternative left an uncomfortable pit inside of his stomach.

"So…how've you been?" He frowned at the dark circles he could see under her eyes. "You sleepin' alright?"

"As well as can be expected," Lin brushed the question off dismissively, her green eyes traveling around the apartment, looking anywhere but him. "How is everything in the United Forces?"

Bumi smiled as he answered, "Great. Quiet, but great. We've been doing missions in the North Pole to acclimate ourselves to harsh weather conditions, rough seas…but nothing major."

Lin nodded. "That's good. Being able to adapt to less than ideal environments is vital to survival."

Bumi tried to catch her gaze, but the whistle of the kettle called her away. "Speaking of less than ideal environments," Bumi began tentatively as she poured them both a cup of tea, "are you planning on—"

"No." Lin's voice was sharp as she placed the kettle back on the stove and carried the two mugs of tea to her kitchen table.

Bumi stood up and walked over to the table, accepting the tea she knew he wouldn't drink. "Are you sure? It would mean the world to Mom, you know. To have you there…"

Lin pulled out a kitchen chair and Bumi did the same, sitting across from her at the small table.

"I won't go, Bumi. Tell Aunt Katara I'm too busy with work…"

"You know she won't believe that," he said, a frown deepening the lines that had begun to show around his eyes and mouth. "You're the chief, Lin. You can take off one afternoon for a wedding."

Lin stared at the curls of hot air rising from her tea. "My invitation was a formality. He doesn't actually want me there."

Silence fell between them. The sorrow she saw in Bumi's eyes when she finally met his gaze momentarily shocked her. The last time she had seen such a miserable expression on his face was at his father's funeral.

"You don't really believe that, do you?" Bumi said at length, searching her eyes for the truth. He found it.

"Yes, I do." Lin never lies; it was a habit she had picked up in childhood, when her mother could sense a lie a mile away. "I would only be a reminder of a time in his life that's dead and gone. People don't like relics hanging around, especially on their wedding day."

Her eyes were downcast as she took a sip of tea, letting the liquid scald her mouth. She couldn't feel it, anyway, with the headache that had blossomed behind her temples.

"Lin." Bumi's tone was so uncharacteristically grave that she could not help but lift her eyes to his. "You're not a relic, you're a person. A person my brother still cares about more than he's willing to admit. If you don't want to go to the wedding, that's your choice. But don't do it for his sake, do it for your own. Thanks for the tea."

There was a harsh sound of Bumi's chair scraping against the kitchen floor, and he was out the door in the next moment, never once looking back to see her reaction. His tea cup was left untouched, its heat fading as Lin contemplated the empty space where his body had been.

It was nearly an hour before she moved again. She took up her own mug, which was still full—she only took one sip before she had lost all desire to drink its soothing contents. She grabbed Bumi's and was dumping it in the sink when there was a light knock on the door.

"Lin?" came a female voice that had once been very familiar. "Lin, are you home?"

Sighing, not in the mood for another visit, Lin went to the door. She would tell the guest to leave her be. She wasn't in the mood to entertain tonight.

The door opened to reveal Kya, dressed in her typical water tribe garb, looking a bit disheveled with her hair coming out of its ties and the light jacket she hastily pulled over her shoulders hanging at an odd angle.

Lin allowed the waterbender to walk past her into the apartment, words of protest dying on her lips.

"I haven't been in here for ages!" Kya said as she looked around the apartment, taking in every detail down to the unwashed tea mugs in the sink. "Looks like everything is just the same as when I left."

"I'm not much for decorating," Lin said in a hollow tone, irked when Kya curiously went into the kitchen to get a better look. Following the older woman, Lin inwardly cringed when Kya fingered through the police reports on her kitchen counter. She was just like her mother; too nosy for her own good.

"What's this?" Kya broke into Lin's thoughts, holding up the invitation she had hidden at the bottom of the pile.

"You very well know what it is," Lin said sharply, her patience gone.

"What I meant to say is why didn't you open it?" she was fingering the envelope's seal, which had remained unbroken.

Walking over to the gray-haired woman, Lin snatched the invitation unceremoniously from her grasp. "I didn't need to," she snapped. "I knew what it would say, and I knew I didn't want to read it."

There was hurt in Kya's blue gaze as she watched Lin throw the letter unceremoniously into the trash.

"Lin…"

"Save it, Kya. Bumi already gave me a speech. I don't need one from you too."

Kya's mouth shut, but her eyes spoke what was left unsaid. _Don't do this. Don't shut everyone out. Let me help._

Lin used to admire Kya's compulsive need to help others. Now that she was on the receiving end of it, however, it was infinitely less endearing. She didn't need any help. She was getting along just fine on her own.

"Don't you have somewhere else to be? The maid of honor needs her beauty sleep, after all." Lin turned away, holding her arms close to her body, fingers white as they pressed into the sleeves of her tunic.

Sighing sadly, Kya walked up behind the earthbender and placed a caring hand on her shoulder. Lin wanted to shove it off, but hadn't the energy to do so. She was drained, and her façade of strength and indifference was threating to crumble.

Kya's voice seemed to come from another place, another world. "You know, when we were younger, you were the little sister I never had. And then when you and Tenzin got together, I was happy because I knew that one day you would _truly_ be my sister."

Feeling Lin start to shake beneath her fingers, Kya rubbed her shoulder soothingly and continued, "I know that things between the two of you didn't work out, but I just wanted to let you know that you will always be a sister to me, regardless of whom he marries."

Gently pressing Lin's shoulder to turn so that she would face her, Kya locked gazes with the earthbender. There were no tears in Lin's eyes, but her shoulders continued to tremble as Kya said, "I'm not asking you to be happy about the wedding. I just don't want you to forget that you are still a part of our family, and families stick together."

Kya pulled the younger woman into a crushing hug. Lin's lips moved, but no sound escaped. When they parted, the words were in her eyes instead. Kya understood.

_I'll go._

When Kya left, Lin felt the emptiness or her apartment acutely. She paced around her living room, the heavy taste of metal in her mouth again. She would attend the wedding, but not by Pema's invitation. She would go on her own terms.

The next day, Lin arrived late to the ceremony, wearing a black dress that fell all the way to her ankles. She knelt in the back of the Air Temple, observing the marriage ceremony from afar. Afterwards, Lin forced herself to stay for the reception.

She was alone at a table, frowning into her champagne, when the bride and groom greeted her.

"Lin! You made it," Tenzin said, clearly surprised. He looked to his wife as if for confirmation.

"See, Tenzin? I told you I sent her an invitation!" Pema said, voice playfully defensive despite the guarded look in her eyes.

Lin smiled through thin lips. "Yes, that was very nice of you. Congratulations," she lifted her glass in a toast, fingers gripping the glass a bit too tightly. They newlyweds thanked her and moved on to speak with the other guests.

As Lin watched Pema's ceremonial robes get lost in the crowd of well-wishers, she reminded herself that she did not hate the girl—no, not at all.

After all, now she was family. Whether Lin liked it or not, they were related. Not through blood, oh no. Blood was not nearly a strong enough adhesive to keep such different people together.

Finishing off her champagne, Lin set out to find Katara, Bumi, and Kya. It was time to do some mending. Regardless of who had entered into their midst, these people would always be her family, and, as Kya rightly put it, families stick together.


	18. Melody

A/N: I most certainly do not own Legend of Korra.

This piece is particularly special to me. I love lullabies, so I did some research and found one that I liked that was in a Native American language. I believe_ "Ho, ho, watanay"_ to be an Iroquois (specifically Mohawk) lullaby, but please forgive me if it isn't. Translated, those words mean, "Sleep, sleep, my little one." And "_Ki-yo-ki-na" _means "sleep now." Again, if this is not an accurate translation, please forgive me. I do not speak this language. I took the liberty of allowing the Southern Water Tribe to have lullabies spoken in a different language. I hope you enjoy this chapter!

* * *

_**Melody**_

The cries of an infant carry all the way down the street as Toph Bei Fong hurries through downtown Republic City. Citizens stop and stare at the new mother, whispering to one another as the chief bustles past, holding her shrieking baby at arm's length, face contorted with the strain of having listened to the infant cry for hours without it stopping for so much as a breath. Eventually it becomes clear to the onlookers that she is heading for the docks at the edge of the city.

The crying does not stop when Toph boards the boat. The baby thrashes its little fists, throat raw but still capable of screeching. Toph bounces her daughter up and down, wondering how a child so small could be so loud. Surely the entire city could hear her incessant crying…

Within her first few steps on the island, Toph was able to pinpoint the exact location of her friend. Using her earthbending to propel them to the Airbending compound, Toph and her baby arrived at the back door of the kitchen in no time at all. Bursting through the door without knocking, Toph presented the hysterical infant to a surprised Katara, who had been busy fixing dinner.

"Make it stop!" Toph shouted over her daughter's wails, pushing the baby into Katara's open arms.

Katara laughed lightly as she rocked Lin slowly. "Did you try feeding her? Changing her?"

"Of course I did!" Toph exclaimed, pinching the bridge of her nose when the crying did not abate immediately, as she had hoped it would. Katara had always had a way of making children behave… "She isn't hungry and she isn't wet. She has no reason to cry, yet she's been at it for hours!"

Katara chuckled. Toph did not see the humor in this situation.

"What are you laughing at, Sugar Queen?"

Katara's eyes were smiling, though Toph of course was none the wiser. "A baby doesn't need a reason to cry, Toph." Moving towards the stove, Katara grabbed the tea kettle with one hand while still rocking Lin in the other. "Why don't you sit down? I'll make you some Jasmine tea."

Suddenly exhausted, Toph dropped into a chair at the kitchen table. She could not help but admire the way Katara was able to continue going about her business in the kitchen while rocking a baby. She could hear dough being kneaded, vegetables being washed, tea being poured…

When she was finished fixing everything on the counter, Katara came to sit across from Toph at the table. The baby continued to fuss, but the cries were a bit less piercing as they were before.

Rocking the baby with both arms now, Katara started to sing. Toph listened, captivated by the spell of the waterbender's soothing voice.

"_Ho, ho, watanay, Ho, ho, watanay…"_

The simple melody spiraled, soared, rose and fell with grace. Toph had known that Katara had a beautiful voice, but there was something faintly hypnotic about this particular tune. It was a native lullaby. One her mother had taught her, perhaps...?

Lin's cries fell to faint whimpers. Her green eyes sparkled as they observed Katara with wonder.

"_Ho, ho watanay, Ki-yo-ki-na, Ki-yo-ki-na."_

The last note hovered, lingered, unwilling to break the spell. Lin's little hands stretched up, trying to touch the source of the music. Merciful silence followed, the baby thoroughly consoled. But the silence also felt empty, as though something beautiful had been irrevocably lost. Toph almost asked Katara to continue, but stopped herself, unsure what to say. This sort of situation was foreign to her.

Katara rocked the baby, humming quietly to herself. Slowly, Lin's eyes were weighed down by the melody. When Katara was sure the baby was asleep, she stood and handed her back to her slightly bewildered mother.

"It worked!" Toph whispered as she held her daughter close to her chest.

"It hasn't failed me yet, and I've had three of them," Katara said with a hint of pride in her voice. "They're out with their father today, or else you would be able to see just what that song does to _them_."

The smooth, soft skin of Lin's face was relaxed, her expression peaceful. Toph could hear Katara returning to her duties around the kitchen and felt a bit out of place.

"Thank you, Katara." Very seldom did Toph offer true words of gratitude. As Toph stood from the table to leave, Katara hummed a "mhm-hm" in reply.

When the door slid closed behind the earthbender, a few loose notes of another melody slipped through after her. Lin's tiny fingers fisted the fabric of Toph's shirt, fast asleep.

* * *

Lin didn't plan on staying for dinner, but Tenzin insisted. It was a month after Amon's defeat, and Korra, Mako, Bolin, and Asami were all spending a nice evening on Air Temple Island. Lin had just dropped by, bearing the news that a police investigation had proven Noatok and Tarlok were in fact dead. Tenzin wanted the metalbender to stay and celebrate, but Rohan was crying up a storm of tears and the sound made Lin's stomach pitch and roll. All through dinner, Lin tried to ignore the cries that seemed to bother no one else. When everyone retired to the sitting room, Pema continued to rock the baby, to no avail.

A card game was suggested by Korra, and everyone gathered round to play, sitting on the floor in a circle. Pema remained off in the corner, sitting in a rocking chair, humming absently, trying to soothe the poor little baby. Lin passed on the game, intent on leaving as quickly as courtesy would allow, but paused on her way towards the door. She had heard Pema sigh, saw her pinch her nose in a familiar gesture Lin was sure she had seen her own mother use back when she was very young and the difficulties of motherhood were weighing on her.

Despite the voice in her head urging her to leave before she ruined the small bit of civility that she and Pema had forged between them, Lin changed course and walked over to the exhausted mother.

"May I?" said Lin, offering up her hands as Pema eyed her quizzically. Uncertainly, Pema lifted the bawling infant, allowing Lin to take him up into her arms. The rest of the room went silent as Lin held the baby close to her chest. Korra's mouth dropped open, as did Bolin's. The look of shock on Tenzin's face almost made Lin reconsider, but it was too late to stop now. The song was climbing up from deep inside her.

"_Ho, ho, watanay, Ho, ho, watanay…"_

Pema's eyebrows lifted, Asami let loose a little gasp, Ikki squealed in delight, and Korra's jaw nearly hit the floor as the melody lifted into the air, gossamer light and unexpectedly beautiful. No one had known that the sharp-as-knives metalbender also had an exquisite mezzo-soprano voice.

Rohan's wails were suddenly nothing but small whines. Eventually they stopped altogether as he became transfixed by Lin's gentle, tentative voice.

"_Ho, ho watanay, Ki-yo-ki-na, Ki-yo-ki-na."_

Lin was aware that all eyes were on her as she rocked the month-old infant to sleep, continuing to hum. The silence when she stopped was profound. Content that the baby was thoroughly lulled to sleep, Lin offered Rohan back to his mother. Pema took him, face an amusing mixture of shock and gratitude.

Without the baby in her arms to keep herself occupied, Lin felt at a loss for what to do. They were all still staring. Why were they staring? She just wanted the tyke to stop its infernal crying, and that was the only way she knew how…

"Where did you learn that song?" said Korra, finally breaking through the silence. "I haven't heard it since I was a toddler in the South Pole."

Lin's eyes suddenly found the mantle of the fireplace very interesting. How much did she want the teenagers and the children to know? Had Tenzin ever told them that they had grown up together…?

"My aunt taught it to me. When I was young she would sing me to sleep whenever my mother wasn't around." Lin exchanged a glance with Tenzin before turning to Pema. "Thank you for dinner. And have a good night, all of you."

With that, she turned and left, conscious of the silence that followed her out the door. But just as she was turning down the hallway, she could have sworn she heard the light, airy voice of Pema singing, repeating the last few notes of the melody.


	19. Never

A/N: I don't own Legend of Korra

This was such an interesting chapter to write. I loved thinking about what Tenzin's absence would do to Lin's perception of the island.

* * *

_**Never**_

For months after Tenzin left with his father to travel the world, Lin felt out of place living with Katara on Air Temple Island. There was a hollowness about the place; an emptiness more profound than the mere absence of her friend and uncle. What had once felt as much her home as her mother's apartment now seemed foreign to Lin, as if this was an uncharted land she could never have called home.

She could sense it as she walked, as if lost, around the island after dusk. Something had shifted in the air, in the earth. The flowers sulked and the trees dropped their leaves in haste to be rid of them. The island seemed to have lost its spirit, its very character. Nothing felt the same.

Oftentimes when sleep was impossible, Lin would leave the female dormitories to wander down to the beach or out to one of the many cliffs at the edge of the island, visiting the places she had loved the most as a child. The soil felt too hard beneath her bare feet, the rocks too cold, the earth too quiet.

During the day, Lin could sense the stares of the air acolytes on her back. They had been very kind to her after her mother had passed away, but now, with her greatest advocate, Aang, half a world away, their tolerance seemed to have worn out. Where once she had been met with sympathetic smiles, she now found only cross faces scowling back at her. She understood the acolytes' discontent; she did not belong here, and while Aang's presence was usually enough to implore them to let her stay, even the famed generosity of the air acolytes had a limit.

In any case, it was clear that both the island and its inhabitants wanted her gone.

It was not until many months after Tenzin had left that an unsettling thought struck Lin. Perhaps it was not the island that had changed so much in so little time, leaving her behind, lost to the memory of a place she once knew.

Perhaps…perhaps it was _she _who had changed.

The concept was alarming, but immediately Lin knew it to be true.

She had joined the metalbending academy only days after Tenzin had left. At daybreak every morning she took the first boat from Air Temple Island to Republic City, tired, sleepless eyes trained on the retreating silhouette of the island. When the boat was far enough away from the island's shore, Lin would take in a deep, shuddering breath. Lately living on the island had felt like living underwater.

Awake, she trained in Republic City. Asleep, she drowned in Yue Bay.

No amount of kindness and acceptance from Katara could change the way Lin felt. Her aunt could only watch as Lin's sixteen-year-old body became hard and thin, muscles made from little nourishment besides her own strength of will. Katara tried to get her to eat home cooked meals, but Lin would return to the island later and later in the evening, claiming to have already eaten. The waterbender suspected that Lin was avoiding her, but she could not fathom a reason as to why. She had been raising the girl since her mother's death, yet their bond seemed to be withering.

For an entire week, Lin returned from the city well after the Air Acolytes had dimmed the lamps and blown out the candles of the compound. Katara waited for her at the docks, worried that she had given Lin too much freedom; clearly she was too young to be spending so much time in the city alone. When the girl did not return until half past midnight, Katara warned Lin that she needed to come home before sundown or else she would withdraw her from the academy. After that Lin insisted she would make an effort to return earlier.

For two weeks she arrived before sunset, as promised, and ate dinner with a relieved Katara every single night.

Then one day, Lin did not return at all.

Katara waited up long into the night, certain Lin would come home apologizing with yet another excuse. When daylight arrived and Lin was nowhere to be found, Katara became frantic. She used her waterbending to take her across the bay quickly. She marched into the Bei Fong Metalbending academy and demanded to see Lin.

The look of confusion on the metalbending instructor's face made Katara's stomach drop. They stood in a narrow hallway with many doors and connecting hallways on either side, Katara's worst fears tugging on the end of her braided hair. The instructor, still with an air of uncertainty, checked his roster.

"Lin Bei Fong? She hasn't attended class all week. She said she wasn't feeling well. Looked it, too," said the instructor, flipping through his attendance list. He had dark brown hair that fell into his eyes and a young, boyish face. "I told her it was all right to take a few days off. She's been working herself to death and I'd hate to see her burn out, what with all the other jobs she seems to have around the city…"

"Other jobs?" said Katara, uncertain if she had heard correctly. "What _other jobs_? She's only sixteen."

The instructor seemed to realize too late that he had said too much. He stumbled over his next few words, "W-Well, I… I don't think it's my place to…to say much as to what Ms. Bei Fong does outside of—"

"I don't think you understand, sir, that Lin is in my care. I am responsible for her safety," Katara's words were embedded in a rush of emotion. "She did not come home last night. If you have any information regarding her whereabouts, you must give it to me so that I can find her."

The instructor's discomfort was clearly visible on his face. He clenched his jaw and seemed to weigh his words before saying, "Lately she's been seen around the city working odd jobs. Running errands and doing favors for people when her training at the academy is over. But the other day I could have sworn I saw her getting caught up in a Triad ring." A deep frown appeared on his face and he continued, "Please know, ma'am, that if Ms. Bei Fong has indeed taken up with the Triads, she will be expelled from the academy. We cannot have a potential criminal training to be a member of the police squad, no matter how badly she feels she may need the money."

Katara had to fight to keep her voice steady. "Thank you, sir. I will certainly discuss this with her." With that, the waterbender turned and walked in the direction of the exit.

"Wait!"

Katara looked back over her shoulder to see a young boy—who must have been listening to the whole exchange from just around the corner of the hallway—come up behind the instructor.

"Shui! Get back to your job _this instant."_

But the boy did not move. Bright blue eyes shone from behind a dark, uncombed mop of hair as he said, "Ms. Lin isn't in the Triads! They stole her money after we went grocery shopping for Granny and she was just trying to get it back!" The boy's eyes were sincere. He continued, his voice rising in earnest, "She tried to fight them, but they hurt her real bad! I wanted to stop them, but Ms. Lin told me to run away, so I did."

The waterbender bent down so she was on the same level as the boy, who could not be a day older than nine. "Do you know where Lin is now, Shui?" Katara's even tone did not betray the worry that gripped her heart.

"I…I don't know," he whispered, sadness in his eyes. "I went looking for her after I got the groceries to Granny, but I couldn't find her. Do you think she's all right?" His voice trembled and Katara put a gentle hand on his head.

"Of course she's all right." Katara gave the boy a smile she did not feel in her heart. "Thank you, Shui."

The little boy nodded, eyes wet with unshed tears. Not wanting to waste any more time, Katara left the academy with a painful lump in her throat. She knew of one place and one alone where Lin would be, assuming she had gotten away from the Triads. If she wasn't there...well, Katara would think about that later.

* * *

When Lin awoke, the pain in her head was excruciating. It felt as though someone had taken a hot iron from a fire and placed it on her forehead, burning straight through flesh and bone. Vaguely she was aware of her fingers touching dried blood and matted hair at the base of her neck and felt upwards towards a slightly scabbed-over wound on the crown of her head.

Her stomach flipped as she tried to sit up, the world spinning on a crooked angle. Her sight flew in and out, her vision trading off between complete darkness and hazy shapes.

Where was she? What had happened? Why was she in so much pain?

Lin closed her eyes, willing the dizziness to abate and her mind to clear. She needed to think. Think. She was lying on a bed. (_Whose_ bed?) In any case, it was soft beneath her bruised back and shoulders.

Taking in a few deep breaths, Lin tried to focus her eyes on her surroundings. She was in a small room, one that seemed eerily familiar and yet she could not place it in her memory. There was a window to the left of her bed, a modest writing desk to the right. The floor was made of stone. _Stone._

And suddenly it all came rushing back. She remembered the fight in its entirety. With five adult Triad members pitted against her, she had been easily overpowered. Fighting back only served to cause her further injuries. When the Triad thieves were through, they left her in an alleyway, bleeding on an old cobblestone path. Not dead yet, Lin had pushed herself up and traveled to the one and only address she knew by heart in Republic City. It was only a few blocks removed from where the fight had taken place. It was dark and no one was around as she climbed the steps to her old home. It wasn't until she was standing in front of the door of her mother's apartment that she remembered that she no longer had a key.

Beaten, bleeding, Lin sank to her knees on the cold stone steps. Having lost a substantial amount of blood from the wound she had sustained to her head, Lin could not resist the icy grip of unconsciousness as it grabbed her. But just as her head hit the ground, there was a noise from within the apartment. Someone was opening the door.

Lin now recognized the room around her as what had once been her mother's, save for a few added elements that certainly had never lived in her mother's room while she was alive. There were paintings and photographs framed elegantly and hung around the room. There were beautiful flowers being grown in pots on the windowsill. And on the desk sat countless pens and notebooks, which would have been completely useless to Toph Bei Fong.

Suddenly, the door opened to reveal a small middle-aged woman carrying an armful of bandages and antiseptic. She had long brown hair streaked with gray and dark brown eyes that met Lin's with surprise.

"Ah, you're awake! Well done. I was certain you would be out for another two hours at least." The woman's tone was bright as she walked towards Lin lying on the bed.

Lin wanted to speak, but no words came.

"You gave me quite a scare, you know, showing up as you did, covered in blood…"

Subconsciously, despite her current indebtedness to the woman, Lin wanted to scoff at the implication that it had inconvenienced her host for her to have been beaten so ruthlessly.

"I'm Kyota. I've been renting this apartment from your uncle for almost two years now." She was smiling as she began unraveling a strip of gauze.

"M-My uncle?" said Lin, her voice hoarse. She could feel her lips crack as they formed the words.

"Avatar Aang. The apartment was left in his hands after your mother's death." She was dabbing a cotton ball with antiseptic. The strong chemical smell brought on another wave of nausea for Lin and she nearly retched.

"H-How—"

But Lin's words were cut off as the stranger dabbed at the wound on her head. Lin cried out in response to the sudden pain.

"Hush. It'll be over before you know it and then you can get some more rest."

Lin remained silent after that, allowing the stinging pain of the antiseptic to continue without further complaint. When the woman was done cleaning the gash, she dressed it with gauze in such a way as to suggest a great deal of experience in such matters.

"You know Uncle Aang?" Lin asked as Kyota gathered up the medical supplies once more.

"Yes. I work down at the hospital where he and Master Katara teach healing classes from time to time. But enough of that. You need to rest. You have quite a substantial amount of internal bleeding, several cracked ribs, and a twisted ankle. Spirits only know how you managed to get yourself to my doorstep…"

With that, Kyota left the room, shutting the door softly behind her. With nothing but the silence to fill the empty space, Lin suddenly felt very drowsy. Perhaps she would rest her eyes for a bit…

* * *

When Lin next awoke, there was someone sitting beside her, but it was not Kyota. No, this woman was much more familiar. Seated to her right, hands folded in her lap, was Katara. She looked like a proper lady, waiting for tea to be served. But the worry on her face was enough to bring Lin to full consciousness quickly.

"How do you feel?" Katara asked, voice unnaturally quiet, subdued.

Lin could still feel the pain, but the intensity was gone. Had Katara healed the worst of her injuries without her waking up? "Better."

Katara was silent for a moment, seemingly at war with herself over whatever question she was to ask next. Finally she spoke, "Why didn't you just let the Triads have the money? What were you thinking, challenging them on your own? They could have killed you!"

Lin turned over onto her side, facing away from her aunt, not wishing to look into her eyes. "It wasn't my money. The old granny gave us too much for her groceries. I needed to return it to her. She doesn't have a lot of money to spare and times are hard. I wasn't about to let the Triads take it away without a fight."

Katara's exasperation was evident in her voice, "But you can't go risking your life for money! Nothing, and I mean_ nothing_ is worth getting yourself killed over. Do you understand me? Lin, look at me." Katara waited. Lin did not move at first, but after a few moments slowly turned back onto her other side so she was once again facing her aunt. "Your life is precious. Do you think your mother would have wanted you to throw it away? And what would I have told your uncle if you had died? What would I tell Kya, Bumi and Tenzin? That you were killed fighting men three times your age and skill level over a couple of yuan?"

There was silence for a few long moments before Katara continued, "I was worried sick. Do you know what it is like to wait up all night for someone you love to walk through the door, when they should have been home at sundown? Do you know how shocked I was when your metalbending instructor told me you were doing jobs I didn't know about around the city? And my heart nearly stopped beating when a little boy told me that you had been involved in a fight with members of the Triads. I didn't know what I would find, when and _if_ I found you."

Lin's eyes were focused on the space above Katara's head. Closing them briefly, Lin exhaled and tried to sit up. Katara moved to help her, but one look from the teenager was enough to stop the waterbender in her tracks.

"I'm sorry, Aunt Katara. I should have told you about the jobs. But I didn't want you to be angry with me."

"And why would I be angry?"

Lin hesitated. "I want to leave Air Temple Island. I'm trying to save up enough money so that I can move out on my own as soon as possible."

Katara's eyebrows lifted, her facial muscles being pulled into an expression of the utmost surprise. "Why would you want to leave? Don't you like living with your uncle and me on the island? Aren't you happy?"

There was a stab of pain somewhere in Lin's ribcage, dangerously close to her heart. "I…I love you and Uncle Aang. You're the best parents a girl could ever want. But I don't belong on Air Temple Island. Republic City is my home. I need to be here to protect people like that old granny from the Triads. I want to be where I am needed most, and people need me _here, _not on Air Temple Island."

Lin was surprised to find herself suddenly inside of Katara's strong embrace. "If you want that badly to leave, I will help you. But please, don't ever scare me like that again. There are other ways to help people than to risk your life, Lin. Promise me that you will _never_ put your life in danger like that again." Lin could feel Katara's voice vibrating in her chest, thick with the pain of a mother begging her daughter to be safe despite knowing the impossibility of such a request.

"Never," Lin promised. But somehow, even as she whispered the word into Katara's warm embrace, she knew it was a lie. She would lay down her life a million times over to uphold her mother's legacy. Though she did not know it at the time, Fate had already set the stars in place. She would sacrifice herself for Tenzin and his family many times over the coming years, and never once did she regret it. _Never._


	20. Recovery

A/N: So sorry for the long absence! I lost power for two weeks due to a hurricane and just managed to get it back. I hope you all haven't given up on this story yet. I hope to be much more punctual with updates in the future. I hope you enjoy the new chapter. Please let me know what you think!

I don't own Legend of Korra

* * *

_**Recovery**_

Kya had always suspected that she understood the mechanics of the human mind better than either of her brothers. When she was young, she read countless books on the subject; by the time she was eight, she could very readily work her way through the brain, from stem to crown, naming each area and its function. She was fascinated by psychology; by the way all things were connected in the murky undertow of experience and memory. She wanted to be a healer, and healers needed to understand not just the symptom, but the source. All minds were like rivers that she coaxed gently out to sea.

That evening, Lin's mind was an ocean.

Kya knew there were things about Lin that she would never understand. When all was said and done, the earthbender confided her thoughts in precious few people. Kya had been one of those people, long ago when the word "family" still held enough weight to carry Lin's heart.

Lately the word would tremble beneath a pebble.

Kya mildly regretted the decision to have dinner with Lin as she knocked on her door. The steps looked worn away by the daily clang of metal boots on tired stone. The mail box was full of yet-to-be opened letters, and the windows of the apartment were caked with dirt and decorated by several elaborate spider webs.

Kya knocked three times—one quick and light, the next two drawn out and punctuated by the spaces in between—as per the knocking system the two girls had used since they were kids. The door opened shortly after, green eyes and brown hair appearing from a dark entranceway.

"Kya," Lin said by way of greeting.

Managing to pull a smile onto her face, Kya nodded. "May I come in?"

Lin's answer was to step back, allowing the waterbender to pass.

There are some things Kya always accepted to be true. The sun rises in the morning. Flowers bloom in the spring. The tide flows in and out under the guidance of the moon. Beifongs are the most stubborn creatures known to man…

But not tonight. Tonight, Kya was going to get the answers the newspapers lacked.

The apartment looked just as it always did; it was clean, sparsely decorated, and lacking the usual amenities of a home. There were no framed photographs or little odds-and-ends that would suggest it was not just a dwelling, but a home.

"I'm making pasta," came Lin's voice, puncturing Kya's train of thought.

She was indeed. The kitchen counter held the fixings of a sauce and several boxes of pasta in various shapes. As Kya watched, Lin's hands shook almost imperceptibly as she filled a pot of water. With a pained sigh, Kya walked over to the metalbender, who was now fiddling with the knob for the gas stovetop.

"Why don't you let me—"

"Despite what you and your mother think, Kya, I_ am_ fully capable of cooking." Placing the pot of water over the flame, Lin moved to grab a box of pasta.

Kya had suggested they go out to dinner, when they made plans to see each other before Kya was to return to the South Pole. She had come up to meet her newly born niece, Ikki, but as it turned out, there was much more going on in Republic City than she had ever expected. Kya assumed that Lin refused to meet at a restaurant for this reason. She would much prefer to stay at home, out of sight, where she could recover from her injuries in peace.

"I know you can cook, Lin. I just don't want you overtaxing yourself. Please, let me make the dinner for you."

The taught muscles in Lin's shoulders relaxed a bit. Turning around, Lin gave Kya a look of annoyance, but then conceded. With a wave of her hand towards the stove, Lin let Kya take over.

Sitting down at the kitchen table, Lin put her face in her hands. "I feel like my mother," she said with a grown. "She always made Aunt Katara cook for her."

Kya laughed, but the humor couldn't remove the uncomfortable twisting of her stomach. She had tried not to stare at the trembling in the woman's hands, or the sickly gray tinge of the face that was now hiding behind them.

Kya wondered if her mother knew just how badly Lin was faring now that she had been released from the hospital. Even after all these years, Katara still felt responsible for Lin's health. No amount of silence or distance between them could remove Katara's need to be the mother Lin had lost.

When the pasta was done cooking, Kya strained it in the sink and then proceeded to add the sauce. Lin silently stood to get them both plates and utensils.

The harsh, sharp sound of a car door slamming outside made Lin jump as she was setting the table. The plates in her hands tumbled and clattered onto the wood, lost from her weak grip.

Kya watched silently as Lin slowly moved the plates to their proper places. The healer was wise enough not to comment on the way Lin's eyes had taken on the anxious look of a hunted animal.

Kya placed the pasta in the middle of the table, but did not move to serve it onto the plates. She found that she was not the least bit hungry. She had a feeling Lin felt the same.

For appearance's sake, or perhaps just to have something to do with her hands, Lin served her guest a healthy portion of the food before placing a bit on her own plate. Kya sat down, watching the metalbender's disjointed motions with barely muted concern.

When Lin had taken a seat, Kya wasted no time.

"Lin—"

"Don't, Kya."

Lin was staring at the wisps of steam curling in the air above her dinner.

"Lin, you know you can trust me. Just tell me what happened."

Lin looked up, sharply. "You read the papers. You already know." Picking up her napkin, she busied herself with unfolding it.

Kya did know. Lin had dragged herself, half-dead, out of a burning warehouse at the edge of the city. The fire killed at least five alleged murderers, all of whom having evaded arrest for nearly three years. Their bodies were so badly burned that the hospital had a difficult time identifying them as the criminals that they were. No one knew how the Chief of Police had survived the worst of the fire, but even more puzzling was the fact that Lin had been there at all. She had finished her police shift hours earlier and had not been assigned any investigations for over a week. She was discovered at the scene by the firefighters who had arrived long after the rising smoke had been visible to the entire city and the warehouse was beyond saving.

"You can't expect me to believe that the whole story was in the paper," Kya said, upset by the way Lin's eyes were growing cold.

"No, I expect you to understand that the less you know, the better." Her piercing stare would have been disconcerting, but Kya had grown accustomed to such glares over the years. She fixed the metalbender with one of her own.

"But why? The men are dead, aren't they? Corpses can't off me in the middle of the night."

"No, but their accomplices can." Lin's face had a sepulchral seriousness about it that took Kya by surprise.

"You mean...all the criminals you were after weren't killed in the fire?"

Lin was silent. Frustration rose in Kya like a wave about to crash on the shore.

Just then, there came a loud knocking on the door. Or rather, several weighty bangs.

Lin's face drained of all color, though there hadn't been much to begin with. When the banging continued and Lin made no indication that she was going to get up, Kya decided to give the person on the other end of the door a piece of her mind, but when she moved to answer it, Lin shook her head.

Eventually the banging stopped. They could hear the sounds of another car door slamming shut and someone revving up the engine before taking off.

Kya looked to Lin for an explanation. Without a word, Lin stood and walked into her living room. Picking up a package from the coffee table, she returned to the kitchen with the air of a person pleading guilty to a most grievous crime.

"They left this a few days ago." Handing the crudely wrapped package to Kya, Lin inwardly cringed as she heard the waterbender's reaction.

"Spirits!" Kya nearly dropped the parcel, which was covered in a layer of dry blood.

"It's sheep's blood. Perfectly harmless—a scare tactic, if you will. Open it."

Kya was hesitant to touch the packaging, but did as she was told. Inside were a bloodied knife and a note that read,

_Suicide is much cleaner than murder._

Kya looked up at Lin, who had weakly sat back down into her previous seat.

"What does it mean?" Kya asked at length.

Lin's eyes were faded, weary of this conversation before it had even properly begun.

"It means I should do them the favor of killing myself so they don't have to bother arranging my murder."

Kya picked up the knife, holding it to the light. "And I assume you think their threat is more serious than all the others you've received over the years?"

Lin sighed. Walking towards her bedroom, she spoke, "If it were just a threat on my own life, it would be laughable. But_ this _came a few days before the warehouse fire." She disappeared into her room and came out with what appeared to be a baby blanket, covered, once again, in blood.

From a distance, Kya was perplexed as to how it connected. "You don't have any children. Where did they get a baby blank—"

The realization dawned on her just as the last word was leaving her mouth. Lin had returned to the table with the blanket in hand, and now that it was closer and in the light, Kya could see the cause of Lin's distress.

Beneath the blood, the blanket was gold, with red trim. An alternating pattern of air nomad symbols and sky bison decorated the top, while on the underside, a name was embroidered in elaborate calligraphy.

"Ikki," Kya whispered.

Lin nodded, fingers white against the caked blood.

"It came with a note as well," Lin said, reaching a hand into her pants' pocket. Taking it out, Lin read aloud in a voice that sounded stronger than she felt, "The airbending race is an abomination. Cooperate, or the baby dies within the week."

Kya was speechless. Lin stared at the note for a moment longer, placed it carefully on the table, and ran her fingers along the name embroidered in the blanket.

"They sent one other letter to the police headquarters. They demanded that I meet them at the warehouse, alone, to make a deal. They wanted me to promise to turn a blind eye to the murders they were planning; they had a list of political and social leaders they desired to be dead. In exchange, they would let Tenzin and his family live..." Lin's voice was suddenly very quiet. Her hands tightened on the blanket. Kya could see the storm rising in Lin's eyes. "I wanted to kill them all. But instead, I made a proposition; they could take my life, and do as they would with their hit-list, so long as the airbenders were left unharmed. With me out of the picture, the murders would certainly be easier, but not guaranteed. They wanted a guarantee."

Lin turned away. She was aware that she was shaking, but ever since the fire, this had been her reality. The doctors said the shaking would fade in time, but Lin resented it as a sign of weakness. She had never imagined in all her years as Chief of Police that one case would unravel her so.

"I fought them. There were four firebenders, three earthbenders, and two waterbenders. I planned to kill every single one of them, but they were not the average petty criminals. As I was fighting several of them, the firebenders escaped and set fire to the warehouse, not caring that the others were still inside."

Lin turned back to face Kya. "They intended for me to escape, though I very nearly died. They knew those left behind would care more about saving their own lives than killing mine. Now, it seems they have changed their minds. They've realized I will not be helping them, so now the death threats come daily. I've sent many of my officers to guard Air Temple Island covertly. The remaining murderers aren't stupid enough to test my power, so for the time being, Tenzin's family is safe."

Kya stood. "But Lin, you—"

Lin held up a hand, the other still holding tightly on to Ikki's blanket. "I can take care of myself. They send some poor kid to drop off the messages each day. I doubt he even reads them. So long as I keep a low profile, I can orchestrate their arrests and/or executions from the shadows."

Lin offered Kya the blanket. The gray-haired woman took it without a word, struck speechless by the sudden image in her mind of Lin as a young girl, talking animatedly about all the lives she would save when she took her mother's place as Chief of Police. At the time, Kya had no way of knowing that among those lives would be those of her brother and nieces.

Lin's next words captured Kya's attention. "Return the blanket to the baby, would you? Make up whatever story you would like as to how it was lost and found." Lin's expression was unreadable as she continued, "Just please, don't breathe a word of all this to Tenzin or your mother. Spirits know your mother would be out of her mind with worry if she knew..." Lin trailed off, unsure what else needed to be said. Her eyes fell back to the blanket. "Washing the blood off might be a good start..."

Suddenly Lin found herself in an embrace. Kya had wrapped her arms around her.

"Why not let them know they're in good hands? Tenzin should know you're in danger. As much as he denies it, he still cares for you, Lin, and would hate to see you hurt."

Breaking apart, Lin shook her head. "He has his family to think of. I shouldn't be one of his priorities. I hear Jinora has grown. Pretty soon he'll have another airhead flying around..." Lin laughed, trying to change the subject to something light. She usually didn't like to think of Tenzin's children. It was a forbidden topic, generally speaking, but now that she knew there was a faction in the city that wanted the airbenders dead, she supposed the past had to be buried until they were safe again.

Kya took this as her cue to put the blanket, the knife, and the two threatening notes out of sight. She had come for answers and had received them. Now it was clear Lin wished to have her mind on other things, and Kya could at least offer her the small comfort of discussing something that did not involve blood and death.

Recovery was a fickle thing. As the two women chatted over dinner, Kya wondered whether or not this case brought them all one step closer to the reconciliation she so desperately longed to see.

Outside, yet another bloodstained package waited on the steps, but this time, Lin would not be opening it alone.


	21. Last

A/N: Here I am, with a new chapter. Thank you all for your continued support. Please know that this story won't be finished until I post my last chapter, "The End." So if I am ever gone for an extended period of time, just know that I will return, if only to post that last chapter. Please let me know what you think of this look into Tenzin's character. Your reviews really do make my day.

_**Last**_

All his life, Tenzin had been last.

He was doomed at birth to a long line of "lasts" that would follow him far into his adult years. He was, after all, the last born child of the Avatar. He was last to go to school and last to wear the hand-me-down robes that had been passed from father to son to younger brother. He was often last to go to sleep at night, when Bumi's snores sought to wake the dead. He was last to begin a career and last to hear his father recount stories of the war. He was last in line, last in thought, and last-picked in every silly game Kya forced them all to play.

But it was not until Tenzin stood in the crowd gathered to honor the memory of his father that he truly understood the bitter loneliness of being "last."

His father had understood it, of that Tenzin was certain. Aang had known the great burden of being last and had endured it with little hope of mitigation. When Tenzin was born, Aang had already been waiting decades for someone who could ease the faint ache of isolation that Katara, Kya, and Bumi could neither understand nor take away from the Avatar.

Bumi would admit, years later, that he had been jealous of his brother ever since the very first sneeze that had revealed Tenzin for what he was: an airbender. The bond between his father and Tenzin was such that Bumi could never hope to forge for himself, having no such elemental abilities.

To his credit, Aang never displayed any outward signs of preference. All rewards, gifts, and even meals were divided equally in three parts. The siblings would squabble over whose cookie was the largest and who would sit at their father's side when he came home from work and command his attention until dinnertime. Tenzin often learned the most from his father during those periods of stolen bonding right before the table was set. Aang would take him up onto his knee and tell him all he knew of life and its many lessons.

Aang had always known how to be a proper father.

Some have it from the start; the innate qualities that propagate paternal wisdom and the saintly patience that all fathers must tap into from time to time. Aang was made to be a father long before he ever became "last."

It was a pity the man was dead. If ever Tenzin needed council, it was then, as he stood among several hundred weeping women and men mourning the death of his father.

Tenzin had known that his father, despite all that being the Avatar entailed, was still human. He could fall ill just as easily as the rest of them, and the spirits would not intervene. All great men must die.

As Tenzin listened to the orator drone on in one even, monotone voice that seemed to suit the mood of the occasion quite well, he felt something move behind him. He looked to his left, and there she was, standing by his side in her metal uniform that radiated heat from the summer sun.

The oration continued, and Tenzin felt his stomach twist sharply, winding itself into a sailor's knot. Lin reached to hold his hand, and Tenzin's mind was suddenly transported through the decades. The memory was hazy, frayed at the edges and yellowed through the passing years, but it was not something easily forgotten. It was another funeral for another father. Lin's father. A father she had never known, but still mourned, knowing that she would never have the opportunity to ask him the sorts of questions a daughter asks a father who was never there. Tenzin had reached out to hold Lin's hand. He had squeezed it, and she squeezed back.

Today, there was no comforting squeeze. Lin's hand was steady and secure in his, and that was all he needed.

It was then that Tenzin realized there was one thing in which he had been "first." One precious thing, one exceedingly beautiful and lovely thing. Of both his siblings, of all his friends, of every acolyte he had grown up with…

He had been the first in love.

With his father gone, Tenzin was now last of his kind, the last airbender.

He would become a father, whether he was suited for the role or not. He would have children, many if he could, in the hope that there would never be another person to bear the honorific "last."

Lin's hand slipped out of his.

She was on duty.

Tenzin did not speak as he watched her go, because of all the "lasts" he had to bear, he knew the worst was yet to come. It would come, and he would break. And when he broke, he would fall. And when he fell he would rise with another woman at his side.

He did not speak, because the only last that mattered now was the one he thought would never come.

The last, and final, goodbye.


	22. Short

A/N: Sorry for the long absence again! Life sort of creeps up on you every now and then and doesn't let you go. Anyway, I hope you all like this new chapter. It is a bit dark, but I was driven to write by the overwhelming sadness I felt upon hearing about the shooting in Newtown, CT. My thoughts go to the victims (18 of whom were children) and their friends and families. Please read and review. I do not own LOK.

_**Short**_

A short, sweet life. That's all Lin expected, from the moment her mother explained the nature of death and the danger involved in her own life's work. Toph was sure to clarify that there was nothing to fear—no one ever leaves for good—but she needn't have bothered. Lin did not fear the grim, sneering visage of Death. She looked it in the eye and waved goodbye, time and time again, as years passed and each loss became easier to bear. She set her sights on becoming a master bender—conscious that her mother had never "looked" into any eyes, grim or otherwise—and wondered if the chief was better or worse off that way.

There were times when Tenzin asked Lin what she thought of the spirit world, and Lin would not know how to answer. What was there to think about? As far as she was concerned, spiritual mumbo jumbo was better left to the acolytes. After all, why would she sit and meditate, mulling over her place in the universe, when there were trees to climb and mountains to scale and boulders to smash? She hadn't the patience to willingly place herself into a mystery whose origins were as old as life itself, and yet was no closer to being solved.

In the end, it was clear to Tenzin that Lin was in no way interested in the here-after; she would prefer the earth to the sky any day.

So the subject was dropped. Life was too short to worry much about its end.

* * *

When Lin became the chief, she knew the risks. She accepted them with grace, with gratitude. What was life, if not a risk itself? She threw herself into harm's way—fought like a soldier, lied like a thief, schemed like a crook—and almost always came out with the criminal she was pursuing in custody. Over the years her scars multiplied and crisscrossed over her skin, leaving trails of triumph and tragedy written in raised, discolored flesh.

The newspapers touted her courage, her valor. They often used words like "fearless" and "resolute," no matter how out of place they looked in conjunction with her name in the place of her mother's. Of course, journalists found much more colorful phrases to use when they disagreed with the chief's actions…

Despite what was once popular belief, Lin did not miss her mother. Or, if she did, she never gave others reason to believe it to be so—not even to those closest to her. She remembered the woman, sure enough, but not as "Mommy" or "Mom;" not even as "Mother." She was first and foremost "Chief."

Sometimes Lin wondered if she herself would die as "Chief" and nothing more, but such thoughts were useless. She knew her mother was more, in her own way, but did not have the words to describe the conundrum that was Toph Bei Fong.

Love, loss, and responsibility were peculiar in the way that Lin often forgot which came first and which remained till the end.

When Lin leapt from Oogi's back, sealing the fate she had known to be her own since the very first time her mother mentioned the word "sacrifice," she thought only of keeping her promise to Tenzin. She did not think of the thousand-foot drop that would follow her success, if she were to take down the ships. She thought nothing of terminal velocity and the un-survivable force with which she would hit the ground. The impact would not be nearly as painful as the blades that pierced Lin's heart when Jinora's eyes connected with her own.

There is remarkable freedom in never having feared death.

* * *

Pema thanked her, once.

They were in the North Pole. Korra had run off after Katara had failed to restore her bending. As everyone idly tried to keep each other's hopes up, Lin slipped out. Snow crunching beneath her feet, the weary woman cleared her mind of all thoughts of the earth she could no longer bend. When she had walked far enough away from Katara's home, Lin let go of a heavy breath that she had been holding since they had arrived in the North Pole.

Hearing the crunching of the snow beneath a light, airy gait, Lin closed her eyes. "Go away, Tenzin. You shouldn't have followed me out here. Go back."

The snow crunched in such a way as to indicate that the person had shifted weight from one foot to the other. Finally, a female voice spoke.

"I'm not Tenzin."

Lin's eyes opened slowly as she turned around. "No," she agreed, "You aren't."

Pema was standing a respectful distance away, as if she were worried that coming within a ten yard radius of former Chief Bei Fong would be a violation of some unwritten code. Rohan was sleeping in her arms, newly born and beautiful in the bewitching way of infancy.

"I…" began Pema, pausing as she considered her words, eyes downcast. Why was it that she could no longer speak to Lin without hearing the words "don't turn back" echoing in the space between them?

"Yes?" said Lin, trying to meet Pema's downward gaze. When Pema looked up, the connection was made, and suddenly Lin understood without having to be told. It was all there, in the deep brown depths of the younger woman's eyes.

_Thank you. _

Lin nodded, turning away once more. She expected to listen to the woman's fading footsteps as she walked away, but instead, the unmistakable crunch of snow got louder as the footsteps drew nearer.

"Why?" Pema's voice was suddenly quick and unexpectedly sharp.

Lin glanced over her shoulder. "Why what?"

"Why did you do it?" Pema was holding Rohan like he was made of glass. She looked down at him, her expression puzzled. "Why did you jump?"

The harsh cold bit into Lin's skin as a crisp wind blew through the air. Pema's robes fluttered, her hair dancing about her face. Lin looked past Pema, into the distance, focusing on the house that suddenly seemed much too far away.

"I don't know," Lin admitted, voice suddenly lost, throat sore. Her green eyes fell to Rohan. "I suppose it was because I had a promise to keep….No," she stopped suddenly, and Pema curiously watched Lin's expression change. "That's not it."

Silence followed. Eventually Pema prompted, "Then what was it?"

Lin was quiet for a moment more before replying, "I imagined a world like the one my mother knew when she was a child. A world without airbenders. I thought of your children in the hands of Amon and knew I would rather die saving them than live to see their bending lost."

Pema had come to stand beside her. They exchanged a brief glance; one in which a thousand words work spoken, and Pema extended her arms, offering Rohan to the older woman.

"Would you like to hold him?"

Lin almost took a step back. She wanted to refuse, if only to retreat into the former detachment she had maintained with regard to Tenzin's family, but the baby was in her arms before she could properly form words of protest.

It was the first time she had held a baby in years. Possibly decades. The baby remained asleep as Lin held him awkwardly in her weak arms, sore from fatigue and overuse. It was then that Pema realized just how exhausted Lin looked. There were dark crescents beneath her eyes, and her skin was pale and stretched too thinly over the bone structure of her face. Her arms trembled a bit beneath the light weight of the infant.

"Lin?" Pema said, placing a soft hand on the woman's elbow to stop the slight tremble.

Lin's eyes lifted from the peaceful sight of Rohan's sleeping face.

"Thank you."

Lin had always liked things in life to be short and sweet. She had never expected to grow old—especially not older than her mother had been before she died—but as she passed the infant back to Pema, she thought perhaps the best things in life were those that endured. Those that were meant to last. And as the two women returned to Katara's home, she realized that perhaps growing old did not mean she had failed. (Long lives were unheard of in her line of work, after all). Perhaps a long life was indicative, instead, of survival. What use is a guardian who dies the first time her services are needed? Surely she was worth more to the world alive than dead.

When the two entered the home, standing side by side, Tenzin asked where they had gone.

The answer was short, but she expected the connotation was long.

"A walk."


	23. Absence

A/N: Written at the request of Sacred Shepard, who wanted the story of the first night Lin spent on Air Temple Island after her mother's death. I hope this does your request justice. Please let me know what you think. I do not own Legend of Korra, but my writing is my own. If you don't know who Satu is, or my story behind Lin taking her revenge against him, please go back and read Chapter 10: Promise. Or, if you want to see how the two chapters are connected, read this one, and then read "Promise," because technically this one happens first. Please review! I really want to know what you think of this chapter, specifically the consequences the events have on Lin's character.

* * *

_**Absence**_

The night was clear. There were stars dotted across the sky, dimmed by the ever-shining lights of Republic City. Everything was still. There was no breeze, no rustling of leaves or wind chime melody to ease the loneliness of the night. Just the earth and the sky, peacefully awaiting dawn. The horizon was lost in darkness where the sky met the sea. All that lay between was sound asleep. All, that is, but a young girl.

A young girl, and perhaps a boy, too.

A girl, a boy, and maybe, in the caves, a poor baby bison beset by a persistent illness.

* * *

Some nights are measured in absence, not presence.

Lin knows this well before her mother dies, and perfectly thereafter.

As a child, most nights would find her waiting patiently at her front door. She would drag her blankets out into the hall and lay huddled inside them as the hours passed and her mother had yet to come home. She would lay her head on the pillow that Katara made for her when she was born—the one that has the Bei Fong crest sewed in green and gold thread—and tangle her fingers in the tassels.

Try as she did to stay awake, there were many nights when the hour grew too late and her eyes grew too tired. On those nights, Toph would open the door to find her little girl sound asleep at her watch post. Picking her daughter up, she would carry the girl back to bed and tuck her in. Sometimes Lin would rustle and awake long enough to confirm with her eyes that her mother had indeed returned, but most nights simply the feeling of her mother's strong arms around her was enough to assure her of her mother's safety.

As a child, Lin did not particularly like to share; Tenzin and Bumi did not always like to play with her for this reason. She would keep her toys to herself—guard them, hide them, and the like—and they would pout and say that she wasn't being fair. But she insisted that she _was_. They were hers and hers alone.

Her mother, on the other hand, was not hers, and never would be.

She had to share her mother with the city, with the country, with the world. Lin was used to it, of course, but there were times when she wished her mother would belong to her as fully as other mothers belonged to their children. The safety of the city came before all else, and Lin would not have it any other way, but a child could wish, couldn't she?

One night, when Lin was fifteen, she sat in the sitting room, waiting for her mother to come home. They had planned to eat dinner together; Lin had made a feast of sautéed meat and vegetables. Lin had learned to cook on Air Temple Island during the days when her mother would drop her off so she would have company. Tenzin did not like her cooking, Bumi tolerated it, and Kya would offer suggestions as to how to improve the taste, but Toph loved the food her daughter made. She had once told Katara that Lin was a "damn good cook" when the waterbender had suggested that the girl needed a bit more practice.

But _that_ night, the food went to waste. That night, Lin waited until midnight before she put it all away. It was not unheard of that her mother would be late to dinner, so Lin had kept her hopes up, expecting the Chief to barrel through the door at any minute, hungry as a flying bison, and flop down at the dinner table without even taking off her uniform.

Instead, Lin waited long into the night and early morning. She felt like a child again, waiting up for her mother, but in her heart she could not shake the idea that something was wrong. Usually the Chief would call to let Lin know she was going to be late.

When the clock struck three, Lin turned on the radio. At three in the morning, one did not expect to hear much in the way of news, but maybe she would find a clue as to what was wrong. The drone of the newscaster's voice spoke of a quiet, uneventful night.

When the door was broken off its hinges only minutes later, Lin did not scream. When she was overpowered and forcibly taken away by a group of men wearing long black robes and red sashes, she did not scream. When she was beaten, bound and gagged, and taken to the outskirts of the city, she did not scream.

It was not until she saw her mother, burned and bleeding, her uniform gone, her underclothes stained with red, that the gag was removed and she began to scream.

* * *

The girl and the baby bison were unlikely friends at best, but Lin needed some means of distraction. It had taken her hours to scrub her mother's blood out of her clothes and off her hands, and even then, Katara had to practically knock down the door to the bathroom and pry the soap from her shaking hands.

The baby bison was very sick. Lin had heard her Uncle Aang explaining to Tenzin that sometimes young bison are not born at the best of health. The way her uncle had said it, Lin knew what lay between the words.

_Sometimes animals die, and there's nothing you can do._

Lin didn't know why she had come out to the caves. Of all the things to do the first night you live under someone else's roof, sitting with a sick bison is not usually one of them. But sleep was not an option, and if Lin had to hear one more "I'm sorry for your loss," or see one more grief-stricken face, she would lose what little restraint she had left and punch them out.

The news of Toph Bei Fong's death had been broadcasted within two hours of the Chief taking her last breath. She had died at 0800 hours, and her body had been removed from the scene at 0930, which meant Lin had the rest of the morning and early afternoon to spend at the police station in her blood-soaked clothes, answering questions to those who had answered to her mother up until the night before, when she left the station at 2200 hours to save the city from a bomb-scare.

The baby bison's body shook with a fit of violent coughs, and Lin drew him into her lap. He was small, as baby bison's go, and she could feel his little heartbeat beneath her fingers as she pet him. He was warm and his fur was soft against the bright red, raw skin of her cleaned hands. Burying her face in the bison's fur, Lin finally gave in and let go.

For the first time since her mother died that morning, Lin cried.

* * *

Toph was not yet dead when Lin arrived; Satu had made sure of that, as his intention was to use Lin as leverage against the Chief.

"_I would die a thousand times before I let you kill scores of innocent people," the Chief was struggling through the pain that shot up from the knife wound in her shoulder and the burns on the left side of her body. She had foiled a bomb plot, one that she had discovered only a day before it was set to be carried out._

"_While we're on the subject of innocent people, do you happen to know where your daughter is on this lovely night, Ms. Bei Fong?" Satu sneered, and the Chief stopped struggling for a moment, hung from the ceiling like a marionette, ropes suspending her over a wooden floor._

_Exactly on time, Satu's men carried in a young girl who seemed to be giving them quite a tough time. Held by two men on either side despite her hands being bound behind her, Lin's movements became frantic as she saw her mother. The gag had hardly left the girl's mouth before she screamed, "Mom!" _

"_Lin," Toph's voice was quiet for the first time since she herself had been captured. _

_Satu sauntered over to the girl, whose eyes were wide with fear as he placed a warm palm on her cheek, smoothing back some of her brown hair that had been covering her face._

"_Such a lovely girl. We wouldn't want her to get hurt, would we?" He moved to stand behind her, placing his hands on her shoulders and strumming his fingers along her collarbone. The two men who had been holding her moved away, but Lin was frozen to the spot by the rhythm of Satu's tapping fingers._

"_Don't touch her!" Toph struggled harder than ever, pulling at the ropes, but her movements only made the knots tighter. _

"_Why not?" Satu's hands moved from her shoulders down her arms, sending chills up Lin's spine as she began to struggle, the tight rope biting into her wrists. "She would make a pretty pet."_

"_I'll kill you!" Toph roared. Yanking at the ropes, the Chief's struggling elicited the sound of wood breaking. The wooden beams around which the ropes had been tied finally gave way, and Toph came crashing to the ground. She half expected the entire vaulted wooden ceiling to come down with her, but it did not. _

_Satu wasted no time. Launching himself towards the Chief, lightning crackled at his fingertips. With her injuries leaving blood all across the floor, Toph did not move quickly enough to avoid him. _

_A scream rang out, and it took Lin more than a moment to realize it was her own._

* * *

Lin did not know how long she had been crying before her tears were all but gone and her throat felt as though she had swallowed a ball of fire. The baby bison had let her weep, his body still and warm and comforting as she let herself unravel.

"Oogi?" a voice called from outside the cave. The bison's head picked up, and Lin wiped wildly at the tear tracks on her face before giving up.

Tenzin appeared in the mouth of the cave, night robes disheveled, as though he had just rolled out of bed. Unbeknownst to Lin, the tips of the sun had just reached over the horizon. Tenzin was carrying the bison's breakfast in a bucket that was hanging from one hand as the other wiped blearily at his tired eyes.

"Lin?" he asked, coming into the cave with a bit of hesitation. "What are you…are you okay?"

The bison stood up on shaky legs to greet his master. Placing the bucket on the floor, Tenzin let Oogi eat. It was a special breakfast made specifically by his mother to build the bison's strength. She was confident the baby bison would live, while his father was a bit more skeptical.

Lin stood slowly, suddenly aware of how incredibly exhausted she was. "I'm—" her voice cracked as the words pushed up through her sore throat.

Tenzin walked to her, and she just looked at him, her eyes red from crying the night away. If it were any other time, she might have been embarrassed to be found in a cave crying at the crack of dawn, but not when her mother was gone and she could not help but feel her absence as a knife driving into her heart.

Wrapping her into an embrace, Tenzin said, "I know."

And like that, the first of many nights spent on Air Temple Island was over. Tenzin never mentioned to his mother where Lin had been all night. In fact, he never told a soul.

Lin made a habit of visiting Oogi in the mornings when Tenzin would come to feed him. Over the coming days, he grew stronger and healthier. He grew up to be as healthy as any other bison in the pack, and hardly anyone remembered that at one time he had been a sickly babe.

But Lin remembered. Lin remembered, because in the absence of her strength, she had had a warm companion to lean on. And just as Oogi grew stronger, so too, did Lin.

So, too, did Lin.


	24. Secrets

A/N: This chapter contains very serious subject matter. Please be aware that while there are mature themes, I do not feel that the content of this chapter is explicit enough to require a change in the rating. Regardless of the subject matter, please enjoy this chapter. It was very difficult for me to write, so please be kind. Reviews of any kind are more than welcome. I don't own LOK. One of my headcannons is that bloodbenders can bend their own blood, too. Take it or leave it, it makes for an interesting story, I think.

* * *

_**Secrets**_

There is danger in knowing.

Tenzin always prided himself with a certain amount of keen intelligence. He was often told as a child that he was too smart for his own good, and he believed it in the cheeky fashion of a child who was seldom in doubt of his own prowess.

"There's nothing wrong with having a good head on your shoulders," Uncle Sokka would say, playfully slapping a hand down on his nephew's bare head, "even if it is a bit bald."

Bumi would snicker at this, and Tenzin would glare until his brother's chortling ended.

Ignorance was never an option for the airbender. He trusted the tired adage, _knowledge is power_. Anything he could learn, he did. Strategy, ethics, philosophy, art…nothing was useless, when applied correctly.

Knowledge was safety. He knew how to sew a wound, build a fire, and gather herbs all before he turned thirteen. He knew how to navigate Republic City and shop for groceries. All the essential knowledge, everything he would ever "need to know," was written thrice in his mind, so as never to forget.

Little did he know that some knowledge comes at a steep and heavy price, and a healthy dose of ignorance, in some cases, may be very wise.

* * *

Few people suspected Kya of having secrets. She was a very outspoken girl who seemed to be in perpetually good spirits. She was the eldest of the Avatar's children, but her nature was nymph-like and her disposition was that of a child experiencing everything for the first time.

Few things could tie her down. Family was one of them, but it was not always the strongest. Only two people in the world knew what was "strongest," but neither dared breathe a word.

One was silent out of respect, the other-well, the other had no say in the matter.

(Tenzin was not one of them)

* * *

Lin learned a great deal from watching Kya. Many of life's lessons were exchanged between the two in the moonlight, by the water. Kya would drag Lin out late at night and they would chat on the beach, beneath the stars, where they would not risk waking the acolytes.

It was during one of these star-lit conversations that Lin became Kya's secret-keeper. From that night on, the knowledge of what the older girl had done would never leave her. It would live locked inside her mind and heart, ripping at the tender chamber walls that kept it prisoner.

"_Lin?" _

"_Yeah?"_

_Kya's eyes were lost in the heavens, tracing her favorite spring-time constellations. _

"_Do you ever wonder what happens when you…" Kya's eyes lost focus, and then closed. "When you…you know."_

"_What?" Lin turned onto her side, supporting her head on her hand. The sand was everywhere—in between her toes, in her hair, underneath her fingertips…_

"_What happens when we die?" Kya's eyes stayed closed, but there was a furrow in her brow and her lips pulled into a slight frown._

_Lin opened her mouth to respond, but the words on her tongue suddenly seemed awfully trite. "You…your soul passes on to the spirit world…doesn't it?" She wished her words did not come out as uncertain as they felt._

"_Do they? All of them?" Kya's voice was awfully quiet. Lin felt a shiver slip down her spine, despite the gentle warmth of the spring air on her skin. _

"_What do you mean?" Lin sat up, now uncomfortably cold._

"_Do they all go on, or just some? What if…what if you do something really terrible…"Kya's voice lost pitch, having lost whatever small wave of strength it had rode out of her mouth. _

"_Kya?" Lin hated the fear that crept into her voice. Hated it, but knew it had good reason to be there. For several months, Lin had known that Kya was sneaking out on the nights that they did not spend together on the beach. Having rooms next to one another did not offer much in the way of privacy…_

_There was silence so profound that Lin almost allowed herself the uneasy comfort of thinking that the older girl had fallen asleep. Then, from seemingly very far away, came the single most dangerous five words that had ever been spoken by the waterbender:_

"_Can you keep a secret?"_

* * *

Lin had never been comfortable with the subject of motherhood and childbearing. This was knowledge Tenzin kept safe, but did not understand. Lin would go pale at any mention of pregnancy, but refused to disclose the reason. Tenzin suspected it had something to do with her mother and father being gone. Bumi had once indelicately suggested that she was just scared of accidently getting knocked up, which earned him a rather painful broken nose.

Not even Kya understood completely, but she knew better than them all the secrets that a young girl can hold within her heart.

"_I'm not just a__** healer**__," Kya whispered, and a tear slipped through the corner of her eye as she met Lin's gaze._

"_Kya—"_

"_There was a full moon last night."_

There are some things Lin would have preferred to have learned later on in life, when she was colder and stronger and her heart was impenetrable (almost).

It's a shame that the most important lessons are often taught through pain, not study.

_Kya brought her legs up to her chest, shaking arms closed around her knees._

"_A while ago I was…I've been sneaking out—"_

"_Kya, I know. You don't have to—"_

"_He's a firebender. A pro-bending champion. He was always so nice. A gentleman. I didn't know that what he really wanted was—I had no idea—he—I couldn't get away."_

_Kya choked on the last sentence, her voice growing smaller. To Lin, looking in her eyes felt like standing by and watching a girl drown, but Kya really was trying her hardest not to cry, and Lin was afraid that if she broke the gaze, the dam would break._

"_I wasn't going to tell anyone. But a few days ago, I felt something—"_

_Lin's hands and feet searched in vain, trying to feel it through the sand, but she could not. Vile rose in the back of her throat. The realization that she had not felt the heartbeat since the night before made tears of her own sharply prick her eyes._

One of Lin's many secrets was that she had known Kya's before being told. She had known that inside Kya there was a life. She had known, because through the earth, she could_ sense_ it. Kya had steered clear of her mother the past few days, and Lin was certain it was for fear of Katara touching her and feeling for herself what was growing. Aang was in Ba Sing Se, on diplomatic business that would keep him away for at least a week after Kya's secret was already dead and gone. Lin was secretly glad; otherwise, her father may have known, and that would mean Katara, Bumi and Tenzin would have known as well…

"_I-I'm a blood bender."_

_The words did not come as much of a shock to Lin as they should have._

"_I know because I—" the tears began to fall, one by one down Kya's pale cheeks, "It's not that hard to do, on the inside—I mean, the blood, I—I couldn't keep his—it was a full moon and…"_

_Lin found the strength to move, to speak. "I know. It's alright. I understand," said as she placed a timid hand on Kya's shoulder. When the waterbender began to sob, Lin wrapped her arms around her shaking form. _

"_It's okay, Kya," Lin could feel both their hearts breaking, and vowed to help Kya mend hers first. "I won't tell. I promise."_

_As the hours slipped by, Lin let Kya cry out all her sorrow, guilt, and fear. As dawn approached, she guided Kya back to the female dormitories, tucked her into bed, and sat on the floor beside her. When she was certain Kya was asleep, Lin let her own tears fall, one by one._

* * *

Tenzin's vast knowledge was always a source of immense pride, but there were several things he did not know, like how to tell when Lin was lying.

It hurt him to know that she had secrets that even he was not allowed to know. He felt throughout their relationship that there were many things she would not tell him. Trust is key in any relationship. Without trust, how could they last?

That is not to suggest that Tenzin did not suspect a few things about his former partner. He knew she had a small fixation on the moon. He knew that she was fascinated by astronomy and the inner workings of the universe. He also knew that every so often, back when they were together, he would wake up in the early hours of the morning and she would already be awake, sitting on the edge of the bed and staring out the window at the night sky.

He knew that even after so many years had passed since Yakone's trial, Lin still dreamt of her mother being blood bent into a coma that lasted over forty-eight hours. She had been only eight years old at the time, but the experience had left its mark on her indefinitely.

Lastly, he knew something that Lin had only mentioned to him once, briefly: that Toph had been exploring "other options" before making the decision to become a mother. Tenzin had wanted to ask Lin how she knew this, but the earthbender was not forthcoming with the details…

Some secrets don't have to be told. Some are simply known, and kept.


	25. Grace

A/N: This is one of my favorite chapters, hands down. I loved every moment I spent writing this. I can only hope you enjoy reading it. This is my contribution to the second Linzin week, set in place by superliz. If there are any artists out there who would be willing to illustrate some of the photographs or images in this chapter, I would gladly write a bunch of chapters at their request as a trade. Please read and review. The reviews are what let me know whether my chapters are good or not. If you have any suggestions or criticisms, go for it. Let me know. This chapter is a long one, but I really hope you stick with it till the end. Thank you so much for your continued support! I don't own LOK, but the writing is mine.

* * *

_**Grace**_

Jinora was often told by her mother that she was her father's daughter, through and through.

Some days, Pema would say it with a smile. The young girl had a sharp mind and a quiet disposition. She was strong; her skill and intelligence set her apart from her peers at an early age. When she was grown, the bright-eyed woman was, in many respects, her father's equal. She was a talented bender, a model mistress of the air. Few could deny Jinora's prowess, for she had grown up between camera flashes, her life captured momentarily, suspended in time, then forgotten (but not for very long).

Jinora never asked for fame; it was handed to her, forced into her hands, tied around her fingers so she could never forget. She did not shy away from it, but Pema had found many shredded newspapers in her daughter's rubbish bin over the years. Not one for confrontation, Jinora let the curious people of Republic City have the details they wanted, offering up bits of her life for distribution as her father and his siblings had done before her.

Pema's eyes were not lenses—focused or unfocused, searching, waiting for an opportunity to…click! They were neither microscopes nor magnifying glasses; her daughter was not a specimen to be examined or an experiment to be carried out.

Pema's eyes were mother's eyes and nothing more.

* * *

Three days before her eighteenth birthday, Jinora travels to Republic City. She leaves before the sunrise, slipping off the island and into the sky on her glider. Her stomach flips, and flips again, as she flies over Yue Bay. There is pink creeping into the horizon. Red, too. Dark red, which seeps and soaks the sky at the edge of the world. Jinora thinks the sun will bleed its way into rising this morning and grimaces at the suitability of that thought. Her stomach flips again, and her glider falls a bit as it catches the tail end of a shift in the wind.

All her life, Jinora was seldom afraid. She found strength in the unknown, bravery when naught but her own shadow stood behind her. She had no choice but to be strong when she had her mother and siblings to protect.

There were days when she was younger when she wasn't strong enough, when Amon had almost taken her family from her. Never mind her bending, never mind her life. It was her sister's fear and her brother's sadness that hurt like no pain she had ever felt before. It was her mother's tears and baby Rohan's cries that haunted her nightmares. Most nights she dreamt of her sister shaking beneath Amon's cursed touch, her mother weeping in some godforsaken cell, her brother's innocence taken right before her eyes…

But occasionally, there were nights when she dreamt of _her_, and she found hope in dreams of sacrifice and loyalty, not loss and fear.

Republic City was quiet at dawn. The city slept soundly while she had lain awake on Air Temple Island, counting the hours, minutes, _seconds_ until she could venture out to see the one person she knew could help her.

It was a hunch, really. There were some things her parents did not understand. She could only hope that the woman she sought would be willing to see her.

* * *

Lin rose with the sun. Watching the sunrise was a simple pleasure that she indulged every now and then when she was off work. As she watched, red and orange melted away the black. Just as the sun was lifting up over the tall city buildings, a peculiar sight met her eyes. Had she less experience, she would have called it a bird, but she knew better.

A chuckle rumbled lightly in the back of the metalbender's throat as the girl touched down gracefully a few feet from the steps of her apartment.

Lin nodded to the teenager, who smiled in response. Their visits were few and far between, but Lin enjoyed the girl's company when she had it. With a careless wave of her hand, Lin motioned for Jinora to come in. The airbender folded her glider, her smile slipping just a bit as she did so.

Lin was many things…

"What brings you here, Jinora?"

…subtle was not one of them.

"The wind," came Jinora's smart response, laying her glider in the hall and following Lin to the sitting room. With Lin, Jinora was not afraid to be herself. With her, there was never judgment, only acceptance. And advice, if asked.

Lin smiled. Taking in the girl's disheveled robes and tired eyes, she motioned for her to sit down.

"Must have been one strong wind."

Jinora gratefully sank into the couch, one hand twisting at the knots that had formed in her hair.

"You have no idea."

Lin sat in her usual rocking chair, leaning back so as to get a good look at Jinora.

"You've grown since I last saw you. How long has it been?"

Fingers pausing in the midst of their entanglement, Jinora supplied the answer a bit unwillingly, "Almost a year. Dad took me traveling; we just got back."

"I see. Your father—" Lin began, but was interrupted.

"—did the same when he was my age, with Grandpa Aang. Trust me…I know," Jinora's eyes looked away as she spoke, her hands falling listlessly to her sides. Her hair was hopeless, anyway.

"Actually, I was going to say that your father never much liked travelling. He was always more of a homebody. I take it you're the same?" The question was innocent enough, but Jinora's expression was immediately defensive.

"No. I love travelling. It's just…" Her eyes drifted again, and Lin could see them getting lost in a thought the metalbender was not yet permitted to know.

"Lonely?" Lin supplied. Jinora looked up, surprised, but then immediately closed off her expression once more.

"Not exactly…it's just…all the ruins we saw, the empty temples and homes…" she paused, unable to find the words to express the turmoil that had come to conquer her mind.

Keeping silent, Lin let the girl search for words. When she came up empty, the older woman sighed.

"Sometimes your bending feels like more of a burden than a blessing, doesn't it?" Lin's voice was uncharacteristically soft, her green gaze gentle as it settled on the young airbender.

Jinora's head shot up. "I…I know it's a rare gift. I know I'm one of precious few people left who can carry on an ancient skill…but what if I'm not—what if I wasn't—" she stopped again, lost.

Time passed slowly, the two benders sitting in silence. Finally, Jinora found the courage to say what had been bothering her for years, lodged in the cavity of her chest like a bullet that should have killed her, but didn't.

"Is it wrong to wish I was more like my mother?"

Slowly, Lin stood from her rocking chair. Jinora's eyes followed the metalbender's movements as the older woman came and sat beside her on the couch. Even with her thoughts as murky and painful as they were, Jinora still noticed the elegance with which Lin moved, the calmness, the regality of her steps.

Taking Jinora's hands in her own, Lin waited until she had the girl's complete attention before saying, "There is nothing wrong with wanting something different out of life than what others want for you. Remember that. And if anyone questions your choices, you tell them that this is your life, and you will do with it what you will."

Jinora tried to take her hands back, recoil into herself and tuck back into her own mind, but Lin held firm. "You're scared of becoming a master. You're terrified of what that means, of what it entails, of what will be expected from you once you are one of only two living airbending masters in the world."

The words were coming in a rush now, but Jinora understood each one as clearly as if Lin had branded them on the skin of her palms. Indeed, she felt as though her hands were on fire where Lin's strong grip held them.

"You're afraid that when your father is gone you will have to lead, to carry his legacy on your shoulders alone so that your sister and brothers won't have to. You're worried that you may disappoint, that people will call you weak if you don't measure up to your father. You think that when you receive your tattoos, you will be surrendering any right you have to live your own life, separate from your culture. You're frightened, and that's all right."

One tear, then two, slipped down Jinora's cheek. Drawing her close, Lin repeated, "It's all right."

Neither moved until Jinora finally pulled away, wiping at her eyes discreetly. "How did you know?"

Taking care to give Jinora space and time in which to recompose, Lin stood and walked to the book case against the wall to their left. Fingers flying over the bindings, Lin found the one she wished to show the airbender and removed it. As Lin returned to the couch, Jinora could see that it was a different woman who sat back down beside her. This woman was one trying her hardest to suppress a memory. Which memory, Jinora could only wonder.

"This," Lin lifted the heavy book in her hands, offering it to the girl whose eyes were now dry of tears, "is how I know. I was a child once, too, you know."

Taking the book into her lap, Jinora hesitated to open it. There was no title—the cover was smooth and black, with no writing at all to suggest the nature of its contents.

"Go on."

Gently easing it open, Jinora read on the inside of the cover some year fifty or so years in the past. She recognized the handwriting to be the same found on every birthday card, every letter, and every gift that was ever sent from the South Pole by her grandmother.

"Your Gran-Gran started it for me, since she knew my mother had no use for photos. That one there," Lin pointed to the first photo. It was an old, yellowed thing that looked as though it had been handled frequently over the years, "was our first picture with all of us together."

There, in black and white, was a photograph of a large family. In the center stood Aang, smiling broadly with his left arm around his wife, whose eyes were warm and glowing in that brief instant after the flash had lit them. Aang's other hand was placed on the shoulder of his daughter, who stood before him. Kya's silver hair was weaved into an elaborate braid that fell to her waist while her smile dared the camera to show her as anything but beautiful. In front of Katara stood a younger version of Uncle Bumi, the mischievous glint in his eye immortalized forever by the photograph. Beside Katara on the right of the photo was Sokka, standing proudly and grinning from ear to ear with his arm behind a very disgruntled Toph Bei Fong, who was not looking in the direction of the camera. Cloudy green eyes half-hidden by her bangs, the chief was turned toward Sokka in a look that said plainly that she was not amused by whatever joke or action he had made while the photographer worked. Jinora could also see, however, that there was a slight smile that pulled at the chief's lips—one that she had attempted to hide in a scowl, but failed. The camera had caught it in the space between.

Finally, Jinora's attention moved to the left of the photograph. There, side by side, stood her father and Lin, no more than five or six years old. The softness of Lin's green gaze drew Jinora in, for it was such an unfamiliar look. Lin was standing with her hands clasped in front of her, smiling as though she had a secret. Jinora was drawn in by that smile—that knowing look—wanting to see just what made the young girl so enchanting. Beside her, Tenzin seemed to share Jinora's wonder. He was looking at her from the corner of his eye, smiling a goofy smile of a young boy who knew nothing of the world.

Looking up, Jinora could see that Lin's eyes were fifty years in the past, searching for something she could not find.

Slowly, Jinora turned the page. As she perused the album, which was filled with newspaper clippings, photographs, letters, diary entries, pressed flowers, and all the elements of a long life lived, Jinora could not help but feel as though she was violating the woman's privacy. Though the album was offered to her, it still felt incredibly wrong as she watched Lin grow up before her eyes.

Jinora noticed that almost all of the pictures were taken on Air Temple Island, and nearly all of them were of Tenzin and Lin together, building sand castles, climbing trees, making snow spirits, drinking hot chocolate that left matching moustaches on their grinning faces…The more Jinora saw, the more uneasy she felt. She knew this was the childhood her father never admitted to having. She knew all of this must have ended one day, and was afraid to see the pictures change.

And change they did.

As the two benders became teens, the pictures were fewer in number. There were a couple diary entries that had been, presumably, torn out of a separate book and pasted among the pictures. Jinora read of Lin's loves and fears. At thirteen, the writing became deeply introspective.

There were pages describing the day she almost drowned in Yue Bay, with pictures of the broken gliders that had washed up on shore days later. Lin expressed her gratitude to Tenzin for having saved her, but also her fear that she may have been the cause of his death, had he drowned as well. She vowed to never let Tenzin save her again.

At fourteen, the pictures revealed a boy with legs too long for his body and a girl with long, messy brown hair and wild green eyes. At that point, Kya disappeared from the pictures altogether. Throughout the years there had been pictures here and there that, had any outsider seen them, would have easily shown that the two were sisters. Though there was a great difference in their ages, they seemed to get along very well.

The day before Kya left for the South Pole, there was a picture of the two with their arms around each other. Kya, now a woman, was just as beautiful as she had always been, with a smile that could melt any boy's heart. Lin's smile was a bit forced, her eyes well aware that this was a goodbye. Looking at the two girls, Jinora thought of what it would be like to leave Ikki and live in some Air Temple on the other side of the world.

She wouldn't dream of it.

At the fifteenth year of Lin's life, Jinora found what she had been dreading. There were no diary entries. No photographs. Just a headline, "Chief Bei Fong Laid to Rest." A single news article, which briefly mentioned the kidnap and murder of Toph Bei Fong and Lin's role as a victim in it all. Having never been told the story, Jinora felt sick as she read the article half-way through and stopped. She didn't want to read anymore.

"It's so sad," she said, finding her voice. It cracked a bit as she added, "You were there…?"

Lin's eyes were dark. "Yes, but that's not what I wanted you to take away. Keep going. Your father comes up again shortly, and then you will see…" Lin's voice trailed off, and she shifted a bit on the couch. "I want you to know that you are not alone. Keep going."

Jinora would have preferred to stop. The next few pictures she came across were of Lin moving in to Air Temple Island, eyes empty, expression lost. Kya had come back for the funeral, and stayed for about a year at home afterwards. The series of pictures that followed were all of Lin, Tenzin, and Bumi back together again, yet none of them held quite the same joyful carelessness of youth.

Finally, Jinora came to what she supposed Lin wanted her to see. It was a diary entry, written in a quick but steady script. It spoke of Tenzin's preparations to leave on a year-long trip to see the ancient Air Temples. At sixteen, Lin did not want her only friend to go. Bumi and Kya had at that point returned to their lives far away. There would be no one but Katara home to keep Lin company, and the sense of impending loss was so acute Jinora could feel it across all the years between the diary entries and the present.

Then came a letter. This one was written by her father. Looking up, Jinora saw Lin nod in affirmation. "That's the one," she said. "He sent that to me while he was traveling. If you read it, I think you'll find that your father shared many of your fears before becoming a master."

Jinora's eyes fell on the date, some forty years earlier. Warily, she began to read.

_Dear Lin,_

_By the time this reaches you, I will be flying somewhere between the Southern and Eastern Air Temples. Visiting my father's old home was enlightening; I know exactly why he left—there were no women! (insert one of Bumi's crude jokes here). But in all seriousness, it was definitely a worthwhile trip. It made my father happy, at least, and lately that is easier said than done._

_How are you, Lin? Your letters are few and far between. I haven't seen you in so long, I'm afraid you may have forgotten me. Has my mother driven you insane yet? Are you doing well in the police academy? Scratch that last question. You could be an officer now, for all I know. Spirits know you metalbend better than all of those teachers put together. _

_To answer the questions in your last letter, I am doing well. My father and I are getting along fine and we have covered a lot of ground in these past few months. It's just that…I don't know if I want to do this anymore. I don't know if I can handle being a master. All this history, all these customs…I don't know if I can live by the standards of my father's people. As much as my father says I am ready to bear the tattoos of a master, I think what he really wants is to get rid of his loneliness. Seeing him in his childhood home showed me as much._

_I will be tattooed at the Western Air Temple at the end of our journey. I asked if that meant my tattoos would be upside down, and Dad laughed. _

_Don't tell anyone, but I'm afraid. The fate of my father's people rests entirely on my shoulders. What if I'm not strong enough? What if my father doesn't like the man I become? You told me once that I was more than just my father's shadow. But what if I'm not? What if I would rather live a normal life, without all of these traditions and customs? I never wanted to be like the acolytes. Is it wrong that I want to do something more with my life? _

_I never told you this, but I don't really want to live on Air Temple Island. I want to be in Republic City, leading the people who have lost their way. Ever since your mom died, Lin, the city's people have been looking for someone to believe in. They believe in my father, but he's always travelling, always trying to patch up the _**world**_. He's the avatar. That's his job. He's never in the city long enough to see that it's falling away from the dream he had for it. _

_I want to change that. But can I, if I have to carry on my father's legacy? If I have to settle down and have children and lead the acolytes to some distant future when people will understand our way of life?_

_I've always wondered why we had to live on an island, isolated from the rest of the world. It's because the rest of the world doesn't understand how people can be happy getting rid of earthly attachment. They don't understand why we focus so much on our spirits, and not on our lives on this earth. And to be honest, I'm only just beginning to understand myself._

_I have to go. My father is starting to wonder what exactly I'm writing to you. He thinks I'm some love-struck teenager with his head in the clouds. Pretty soon he'll be announcing our wedding day, I swear it. I keep telling him we're not like that, but he doesn't believe me. He says he knows love when he sees it. _

_Anyway, I miss you. Please write back soon. Being away this long has made me realize that I have so much I want to tell you that I can't put into words. _

_Yours truly,_

_Tenzin _

Lin waited for Jinora to be done reading the letter before she took the album and shut it gently. Silently, she stood and returned the book to the shelf.

"He must have really trusted you, to say all that in a letter," Jinora remarked, lost in thought. Lin was right; her father had not always been the man he was today, resolute and firm in his ways as the head of Air Temple Island.

"We kept very little from one another, in those days," Lin admitted, sitting back down beside the young girl, suddenly weary. Once again, Lin's eyes were lost in a memory. "We were young, and we were very much in love."

Jinora did not deny it. "I suppose he came home with his tattoos and became the man his father expected him to be?"

Lin's laughter caught Jinora off guard. "Oh, he came back alright. Tall, tattooed, and ready to live the life he wanted. For a long while he threatened to move away from Air Temple Island and live with me in Republic City. Eventually he did just that. But first he did try to live as his father wanted, on Air Temple Island, leading the acolytes through daily meditation and services in the temple. In those days, he resented it all. He was young and rebellious, in his own quiet, serious sort of way."

Jinora smiled, leaning back to rest her head on the couch. "I wonder what changed. Why did he move back to Air Temple Island when he wanted to live in Republic City?"

The laughter that lingered in Lin's eyes faded, and Jinora suddenly wished she could retract the question. "You don't have to ans—"

"Avatar Aang died. After that, Tenzin knew it was time to put the wellbeing of the Airbending race before all else. His father had been urging him to get married and have children for years. Tenzin knew it was his duty to do so. He married your mother, then you came along. And here we are! You're all grown up!" Lin's tone was sincere; there was no remorse, no anger, no resentment. This was how things were meant to be. She had accepted them long ago.

Just then, the grandfather clock struck twelve. The tolls brought Jinora back to the present. They had been talking since sunrise. It was now midday, and her mother would be wondering where she was. Unlike her father, who had received his tattoos while traveling, Jinora was to have hers done on Air Temple Island, among family and friends.

"Lin?" Jinora's voice felt unearthly as it followed in the wake of the tolling bells. The metalbender's full attention was given to her.

"Would you…would you come to the ceremony? I…I would love it if you were there when I get my tattoos. It's in three days."

There was a pause. Lin stood, and Jinora followed. Placing her hands on Jinora's shoulders, Lin nodded. "I would love to come. It will be an honor, _Master_ Jinora."

They both smiled at the honorific.

As the two made their way to the door, Jinora thanked the older woman for her counsel.

"Anytime. Give your parents my regards."

"I will," said Jinora, stepping out of Lin's apartment, glider in hand.

As the girl took to the wind, Lin lingered on the steps.

_Good kid,_ Lin thought. _Just like her father._

* * *

Pema's eyes were mother's eyes, and they never missed a single detail. When Jinora touched back down on Air Temple Island, Pema was there to see the change that had taken place.

Jinora apologized for being gone so long without telling anyone. Pema waved away her apologies, and told her to go clean herself up. Her hair, in particular, was a tangled mess. Fingers self-consciously tugging at the strands of hair she had forgotten to fix, Jinora put away her glider and went to her room to get a brush.

Jinora was often told by her mother that she was her father's daughter, through and through

But some days, Pema would see another person entirely when she looked upon her daughter.

There was strength in the girl's stare, pride in her spine, and courage in her heart. She had a strong and wild spirit, a need to help those who could not help themselves. She could be as sweet as she was disobedient, tough as she was gentle.

Pema did not always see Tenzin when she looked upon her daughter, and maybe…

Maybe that was, among other things, a certain green-eyed woman's saving grace.


	26. Freedom

A/N: I am so terribly sorry that it has been so long since I posted a new chapter to this story! I have many excuses but that's neither here nor there! I'm back in action and ready to write up a storm. I hope this chapter makes it up to you somewhat. The similarities between Asami Sato and Lin Bei Fong are astounding, when you think about them. I did not write the poem used towards the end of the story. I believe the author is unknown, but if anyone wants to correct me on that, feel free! Please read and review. Nothing would make me happier than reading what you think of all the points made in this chapter. Please know that I never use characters as mouthpieces for what I believe. I write what I think they would say and nothing more. I do not own Legend of Korra but the writing is my own.

* * *

_**Freedom**_

For two months after the Equalist attack, Asami Sato visited her father every Sunday evening at Republic City's high security prison. She would come towards the end of visiting hours and stay as long as it took for her father to hiss a number of insults and declare, for the world to hear, that she was no longer his daughter. Lin Bei Fong—who had been assigned to Hiroshi Sato's case until such time as the court could set up a hearing with impartial judges and an adequate attorney to argue the defendant's case—would watch the girl return each week with somber, tired eyes. Each time, Asami spoke fewer and fewer words, allowing her father to control the conversation once it was clear there was no civility to be had.

Lin was always present at these meetings to ensure Asami's safety, though the metalbender was quite certain Asami could handle herself. Lately, however, it appeared that the girl was losing health. Most would not notice the slight changes in her appearance—the loose clothing, tired eyes, and lack of the usual make up—but Lin was in the business of noticing anomalies such as these. The girl walked as if she had a hefty weight resting between her shoulder blades; her posture was no longer that of an heiress, but that of a woman in mourning.

What she came to mourn, there in that harsh place where criminals gave her sideways glances and her father spit insults like poison into her ears, Lin could only guess.

It would appear that not all casualties of war were buried quietly beneath the ground.

One day, as Asami was leaving the prison well past visiting hours, Lin could see that the girl was visibly unwell. Her steps faltered on the stairs, and Lin decided it was time to stop guessing and act. Since Lin's assignment at the prison was simply matters involving Hiroshi Sato, she was free to leave when Asami was done. Following the girl down the steps and out into the warm summer's night air, Lin spotted the girl as she sat shakily down onto a bench beside her Satomobile.

Asami sighed softly, closing her eyes for a moment as she mentally prepared herself to get up and drive home. Her visits with her father always left her in such a terrible state, she did not wish to drive for fear of taking her anger and sadness out on the road. At home, with a test track all to herself, she could afford to be reckless. On city streets, it was dangerous—if not to herself, to others—for her to drive with her emotions riding shotgun beside her.

"Ms. Sato?"

Asami started, her heart beating wildly in her chest as she moved to prepare herself for a fight, but found a gentle hand on her shoulder keeping her from standing up. Looking up, Asami saw the concerned gaze of none other than the reinstated Chief Bei Fong.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to startle you," the chief said, removing her hand once she was certain the girl was not going to turn tail and run. "May I sit?"

"Please," Asami said, motioning to place beside her.

Once seated, Lin realized that she did not have a clear idea in her mind as to what she was going to say. Luckily, Asami spoke first.

"How are you, Chief?" Asami smiled, but it did not reach her eyes. "I bet it's good to hear that title again."

Lin's gaze turned to the street as she replied, "In some ways, yes. It's good to be back. But more often than not, I find myself forgetting."

Asami waited, expecting Lin to explain further, but she did not. Then Lin's eyes returned to the heiress. "What about you? How are you?"

The answer was so easily given that Lin expected the girl had practiced it many times before. "I'm doing very well, thank you. The company is back on its feet, working to build a new reputation separate from the one my father left it."

Lin chose her words carefully, hoping to shine light where she could. "Republic City is still a young one, as far as cities go. Its people are very willing to forgive, if given the time."

Silently, Asami nodded, eyes trained above the skyline of the city. The prison was located on the outskirts, at a relatively high elevation, which offered a decent view of the city below.

"Do you ever think about leaving?" Lin's question was quietly and carefully delivered, but the response made it clear that the words had hit their mark all the same.

"W-what?" Asami's eyes were wide with shock, but there was something in them—a small, reflected light of recognition and guilt—that indicated Lin's words were not unfounded. "I couldn't leave. The company depends on me to raise it out of the ground. My father would—"

Her voice faltered, but Lin knew what had been on the girl's lips all the same. Silence followed, and Lin was careful to respect the girl's decision to leave the rest of her thought unsaid.

"Asami?"

Sweeping a loose strand of black hair out of her eyes and behind her ear, Asami looked up at Lin with the air of a rabbit caught in a trap.

"Your loyalty to your father is admirable. I would not ask you to abandon him and all that he has created," Lin paused, uncertain if she should say what had been on her mind for months since the uprising. She knew it wasn't her place to say, but the girl looked so lost and alone, waiting for her nerves to settle enough to drive home and leave the cruel words her father had spoken once again tonight behind her. Steeling herself and her own nerves, Lin continued, "But might I say, from what I've seen, your visits seem to do more harm to you than good to him."

Asami's eyes closed, bowing her head until her face was hidden by her long hair.

Thinking she had indeed gone too far, Lin was quick to apologize, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to suggest—"

"No. You're right."

Asami looked up as she continued, "He doesn't want me here. He doesn't want me at all. Not anymore." Her voice wavered, and she ground her teeth to keep the tears out of her eyes. Laughing bitterly, Asami turned her gaze to the stars, blinking repeatedly to keep herself from crying. "You would think I would be used to it by now."

"Asami, what your father has done to you is not something you are expected to 'get used to.'"

Shaking her head, Asami said, "That's not what I meant. When my mother died, my father changed. He was always in his study, at meetings, or managing his factory. I got used to being ignored, to being alone. He only needed me when there was a celebration, so I could dress up like my mother used to and spend the evening on his arm. I look just like her, you know."

Lin was aware of the resemblance. She had been one of the officers assigned to the murder case of Hiroshi Sato's wife. Asami had been just a little girl then. Despite the girl's youth and delicate situation, Lin still had to take the girl into the police headquarters for some light questioning. She discovered that it was as she had feared: the six-year-old had indeed witnessed the murder of her mother.

The situation reminded Lin of her own, but Lin had been much older when she saw her mother killed in front of her. She could not imagine a girl so young witnessing something so terrible. Lin shivered involuntarily. That had not been an easy investigation, for anyone involved. It was hard to believe that it was over twelve years ago when they laid the poor woman to rest.

Taking in a shaky breath, Asami tried to calm herself down enough to continue. Lin could see it was taking the girl's full effort to keep the tremor out of her voice.

"When I began dating Mako, it opened up all of my father's old wounds. I had no idea he was still so bent on avenging my mother. I should have known. I…I should have known…" Asami's voice cracked and tapered off. She was shaking, now. She wrapped her arms around her trembling body, and Lin felt a sharp pain shoot through her chest. Moving closer, Lin wrapped her own arms around the girl, offering comfort where comfort was long overdue.

"I'm sorry," Asami whispered, trying desperately to get a hold of herself.

"It's alright. Just breathe."

Lin stared at the stars as Asami shook in her arms. The sobs were silent; no sound escaped the girl's trembling lips. There were a few tears, but not many. It would seem the girl was still trying very hard to keep from breaking.

Contemplating her next words, Lin tightened her arms around Asami, running a hand soothingly through her hair, as a mother would. Lin's maternal instincts were few and seldom felt, but in the case of this girl, Lin knew it was what she needed.

"Some say that true freedom comes in having nothing left to lose," Lin said the words quietly, almost to herself. "But you and I…we know from experience that this is untrue. We are never free from the ties that bind us to our loved ones, living or dead. We, who have lost love and family, know that we are no freer for having lost it. You will always have a piece of your heart buried in Republic City, and that is why you feel you cannot leave."

Asami's shaking stopped as she moved to look at Lin, breaking the embrace.

"But sometimes you have to accept that the life you knew is gone, and move on. Your father doesn't need you, and no number of hours spent subjecting yourself to his ridicule and hatred is going to change that."

Wiping her eyes with edge of her sleeve, Asami said, "You're right, of course. I've been silly."

"Not silly. Believing there is still some good in your father is not silly," Lin said, letting Asami reclaim her personal space and build the walls around her heart right back up again. "Some men are misguided. Death changes people; we all cope differently. Your father's methods may have been wrong, but all men see themselves as the heroes and saviors of their own stories. He believes benders ought to suffer the same way he has for all these years. What is remarkable is that you, Asami, do not feel that way."

Looking into her lap, the girl murmured, "For the longest time, I _was_ afraid of fire. But one day when I was younger, I decided I didn't want to be afraid anymore, and that was that."

"_Exactly_." Lin smiled before placing a hand over the two clasped in Asami's lap. "For what it's worth, I'm sure your mother would be very proud of what you've done, and how strong you've become."

The girl's green eyes widened as they looked up. "Thank you," she said, her voice quiet but grateful. "Sometimes I wish I knew her better. She wasn't alive long enough for me to really know what she was like. In some ways, I'm jealous of my father."

"How so?"

"He knew her the best, and longest."

Lin was quiet for a minute before saying, "Do you think of her often?"

"Every day. I keep her picture with me wherever I go." Asami fidgeted with her jacket, withdrawing an old, frayed photograph. She glanced briefly at it before handing it to the woman beside her.

Lin took it carefully, wary of its age. The paper was yellow and crumpled, well-loved in a way that only an old photograph could be. It showed Mrs. Sato holding Asami as an infant, sitting in a cozy chair beside a glowing fire. The woman was beautiful, with long, curly black hair that fell below her shoulders. She looked at her baby with the eyes of a new mother, seeing her little miracle as the most precious being in the world. Turning the picture over, Lin saw a date written some eighteen years previously, and words penned in a different hand:

_If tears could build a stairway,_

_And memories a lane,_

_I would walk right up to Heaven_

_And bring you home again. _

"Did you write this?" Lin asked, showing her the back of the photo.

"I did, a long time ago. I had forgotten it was there, to be honest."

"It's beautiful." With that, Lin returned the photograph after one last look at the happiness and love on the mother's face. Asami took it in her hand and let her eyes linger on her mother awhile longer before putting it back inside her jacket.

"I should be getting home," Asami said, standing on shaky legs.

"It_ is_ late," said Lin, motioning to the stars. "Do you want me to drive you home? You've had a rough evening."

Asami looked as though she were going to refuse, but then reached into her pocket and offered Lin the keys. "If you don't mind, I think that's a good idea. I don't know if I can trust myself to drive right now."

As Lin took the keys, Asami pulled her into a quick hug. "Thank you, Chief. For everything."

Taken aback a bit by the suddenness of the hug, it took a moment for Lin to get her bearings and return the embrace. "No problem, kid. Anytime."

As they drove back into the heart of Republic City, Lin noticed Asami starting to doze off in the passenger seat beside her. Lin chuckled softly to herself, thinking that despite Asami's reputation as a head of industry and hero in her own right, she was still just a teenager.

_These kids_, Lin thought as she turned down an empty street towards the Sato mansion, _they'll be the end of my hard-ass reputation. _And as Lin pulled into the driveway of the Sato estate and moved to shake the girl awake, she realized she was okay with that.


	27. Seasons

A/N: This is my contribution to the Linzin week prompt, _Seasons_. I hope it does the prompt justice. It has been a long time since I have done such a deep analysis of symbolism and character. I hope you all enjoy! Please let me know what you think of all the double-entendres and heavy metaphors. I enjoyed playing with stereotypical seasonal imagery and adding my own spin to it.

* * *

_**Seasons**_

Kya was winter.

She was snow and ice and frost.

She was hot chocolate, old woolen blankets, and comfort by the fire. She was time spent with family while blizzards raged outside. She was sweet and pure, soft as freshly fallen snow. She was the flurries outside the window, dazzling young eyes with hope and wishes and dreams of snow spirits and all the excitement of a day's reprieve from school.

But Kya was also hail and sleet. She was frostbite and numbness spreading through shivering bodies. She was as powerful as an ice storm, majestic as a glacier. Her element was water, and she could save just as quickly as she could kill.

As a child, Kya would drag Bumi, Tenzin, and Lin outside even on the coldest of days, eager to demonstrate her master y of creating snowmen and shaping icicles and commanding the harshest forms of her element to her power. On rare occasions, if they asked politely enough, Katara would join them.

Winter was a time for family. A time for reflection.

When the temperature dropped low enough and the blizzard winds howled their every regret into the bones of unwitting travelers or foolish men who thought they could brave the storm, there was pain. There was loss. There was isolation.

When Kya sought to find herself and her element in the South Pole, Katara did not stop her. There are some things a girl needs to see and learn on her own. Trying to stop her would only increase her determination to leave.

Kya left.

And every winter after, the faint ache of her absence awakened in the chilled bones of her family. It is said that frostbite hurts the most when it begins to thaw.

But Winter, for all its danger, rids the world of bacteria and disease that would otherwise grow, multiply, and manifest itself in those it loves the most. A warm winter means a sickly summer. A sickly fall. A sickly spring. Winter must kill to save. Kill to heal. Kill to prosper.

Kya is Winter, and she is proud.

* * *

Lin was Spring.

Lin was earth and growth and beauty.

Lin was renewal. Lin was new beginnings and melted snow and the stream of runoff that seeps into the ground to awaken the roots of plants yet-to-be-seen. Lin was cherry blossoms and magnolias, rain and clouds and blue skies. Lin was the orientation of the Earth's axis such that the sun could shed its warmth and light.

Lin was spring, and spring meant new-born babies and spritely laughter and blushing teenagers kissing in the garden.

Sometimes, Lin thought, spring was a curse.

Lin was spring, and spring was a spell. Lin was the illusion of perfection, of strength, of prosperity. Lin was sweet honey and green grass and luscious berries picked and devoured when ripe. Lin was earth, and the earth was frequently bearing up its gifts to those who did not deserve it.

Spring is often manipulated, bent to the will of those who claim to love it.

Lin was not Spring. Not anymore.

But she had been once, when flowers grew from the rich soil inside her heart and the earth welcomed her light steps. She controlled earth. The earth controlled her. It was a cycle of give and take, one she both loved and resented. She could not stop the flowers from wilting, could not prolong the lives of every plant and animal that came out in the spring just to die.

Bloom, grow, harvest, die, repeat.

Spring was supposed to be a time to honor the cycle.

Spring was a celebration of life.

(Then why,_ why_, did flowers remind Lin only of funerals, of carnations and roses placed on dark caskets that held that which she could not afford to lose, but lost all the same?)

Lin was no longer Spring.

* * *

Bumi was Summer.

Bumi was leisure and heat and strength.

He was long days and short nights. He was excitement and adventure and the shirking of responsibility. Bumi was wild and carefree and warm. He was lemonade and ice cream and barbeques (when he visited Lin in Republic City—there were no barbeques on Air Temple Island, to be sure). Bumi was risk and life and freedom.

Bumi was _fun_, and lived his life as if every season were summer.

But Bumi was also thunderstorms; heavy rain and claps of thunder, lightning flashes that illuminate all that is wrong and right in the world. He was the storms that come without warning and leave before they outstay their welcome. He was always on the move, a hurricane of laughter and mischief that ripped through small towns and cities alike. He always left a trail of damage behind him; something to remember him by.

Bumi was fierce and uncomplicated, a boy who had never quite outgrown childhood. He was a heat wave, sapping the energy from everyone he met. There was no avoiding him; one cold throw open the windows, hoping to catch a breeze of autumn, but Bumi was never one to let his brother steal his thunder.

Bumi was summer-loving. He was beaches and shaved ice and promises whispered under the stars that he could not keep come morning light. He was love now, think later. He lacked commitment, lacked the ability to _stay_. He was always moving, falling at terminal velocity into a new place, a new town, a new life.

Summer was life lived to its fullest, and Bumi was—had always been, would always be—Summer.

* * *

Tenzin was Fall.

Tenzin was wind and foliage and harvest.

He was hard work and perseverance. He was reap what you sow, share what you have, and live a life lived for others. He was the imploring wind that swept the dying leaves off the trees and into the sky. He was the start of the school year, the commencement of careful studying and lessons learned in good time. He was preparations made for winter.

He was responsibility.

Tenzin was red and orange and gold. He was the fall foliage breathing a last breath of beauty into a landscape destined for death. He was the shifting wind, the evidence of changing seasons. He cooled what summer left uncomfortably hot, easing the oppressive heat with a tender touch.

Tenzin was consistency and certainty. He was not prone to summer's wild rage of storms, or winter's wrathful blizzards, or spring's long, lingering showers of rain. He was gentle cooling, easing into the next period, the next season, without fuss.

Except when his temper was tested. Autumn could call up a gale in moments, wreaking havoc on trees and divesting them of color. For days afterward, the piles of leaves scattered on lawns and sidewalks would be testaments to his power.

Tenzin was the Autumnal Equinox. He was balanced, night and day, dark and light. He was attentive to his duty, and never missed a single harvest. He had a family to support. A standard to uphold.

A culture to sustain.

But sometimes, Tenzin was like the fallen leaves. When he fell, he did not always get back up. He decomposed in silence, letting his world fade to black, into the rich soil beneath him. His return to earth was sometimes graceful, sometimes not. The earth had green eyes and a beautiful smile. Oftentimes the wind would call him away, and he would leave. He would forsake the ground to live in air, suspended by his own strength of will.

Tenzin was only Autumn when he was not willing to _fall._


	28. Battle

A/N: Fair warning: heavy subject matter. Read with discretion. I decided to post my contribution to the Linzin prompt: Battle. Please know, again, that I am not using any characters as mouthpieces for my own beliefs. I did my absolute best to remain true to the characters, if they were to be placed in the situation I have created for them. Please read and review. It means a lot to me to hear what you think of my stories. Happy Father's Day! I actually find it quite fitting that I am posting this chapter on father's day, considering the subject matter.

* * *

_**Battle**_

Some days, Tenzin is much too tired.

His back aches, his eyes sting, his hands tremble with a combination of exhaustion and—something else. Something he could place if he wanted to, but Tenzin has a stricter interpretation of the term "want," than most.

He sees her, sometimes. In the street. They pass each other by without so much as a glance.

A glance would be too much, he thinks. Bei Fongs can kill with a glance, and Tenzin does not know if he is strong enough to fight that fight.

Every day is a battle, and he is not so much a warrior as a worrier, and his armor is not so strong as to keep him from falling beside his sword.

Once, he saw her in a flower shop as he passed by the usual stores on his way to a council meeting. Looking in the window at the woman he used to know, he knew there must be some significant date that he had forgotten; Lin did not waste her time on such silly, fleeting, useless things as flowers.

But had he been a more poetic or artistic man, he would have painted a picture of her, in full police uniform, leaning against the counter as an elderly woman blabbered on about the seasonal selection of bouquets and handed Lin particularly spectacular specimens from the collection. It was a beautiful picture she made, clad in metal, fingers absently brushing the petals of wild flowers much too colorful for her tastes, but he'd be damned if he admitted it. All that was done now. He wasn't supposed to have those thoughts, much less dwell on them, yet he could not will his feet to move and stop his eyes from lingering on the way her hair was shorter than he remembered it to be...

It was clear Lin was a thousand miles away—Tenzin could see it in the slight curve of her shoulders inward, the light tapping of her gloved fingers against the counter, and the absent stare that did not quite focus on the multi-colored, gaudy flowers that were placed in her hands at regular intervals.

Tenzin knew he should continue walking. The longer he stood there, looking in the window, the greater the risk that Lin would snap out of her reverie and feel his gaze upon her. He most certainly did not want a confrontation, especially so soon after his wedding and the birth of Jinora…

When finally it appeared that the old woman had finished her explanation of whatever exotic flowers she had pressed into the metalbender's gloved palm, Lin looked up and thanked the woman, but insisted that she was only interested in the one that she had previously ordered.

As the florist sighed and admitted defeat, she exchanged the flamboyant flowers she had presented to Lin for a single, simple, delicate white rose. Handing the florist a couple of yuan, the younger woman smiled weakly and bid a quick good day. The elderly woman returned it, but not without a slight twinkle of sadness in her eyes as she watched the police officer turn on her metal heels and leave.

It was then that Tenzin realized what it was that he had forgotten.

Staggering away from the window, Tenzin managed to duck into a nearby alley before Lin exited the shop and headed in the opposite direction.

Suddenly nauseous, Tenzin contemplated sitting down right there in the dirty alleyway as he watched her disappear from his line of vision. Instead, he pressed his palms against the brick wall of the shop to his left and breathed deeply in through his nose to quell his growing desire to vomit.

_How could he have forgotten? _

It had been years, of course. In which time they had fallen away from each other so completely that he could not even claim to be her friend.

But that was no excuse.

He knew where Lin would go. He also knew that he could not follow her. The realization that she most likely did not want to have his company on today of all days struck a chord somewhere near the bottom of his heart.

She had every right to be alone.

Yet, he did not want her to be. Not when he can still remember the blood. Not when the night she—they—lost the only thing that may have kept them together indefinitely was so fresh in his mind.

And yet, he knew the thought wasn't true even as he thought it. Lin was fiercely independent and would not have wanted him anyway, just as she hadn't wanted what she—they, _damn it_—had lost until she had lost it.

That was crossing the line, he knew. He did that a lot, in his head, these days.

Shakily pushing himself off the wall, Tenzin straightened his robes and ignored the wave of dizziness that accompanied his movements. He could not go to his meeting like this. He would send word that he had taken ill.

Running a tired hand over his face, Tenzin decided what he had to do, though he was certain it would not prove to be a pleasant experience.

He had to follow her. If not for her, for what they had lost.

Surely, she could not deny him that?

* * *

Twirling the white rose between her fingers, Lin made her way silently to a quiet, lesser-known section of Republic City's park. It was a cloudy day—the sky foretold the beginnings of a storm that would soon drive all of the park's few inhabitants back to the safety and shelter of their homes.

Lin was glad for it. She was not in the mood for company.

Lin had worked the early shift today; midnight to noon. Twelve mercifully eventful hours that had distracted her from her thoughts. There were a few interrogations and several investigations to lead. Lin had thrown herself into work and did not stop until she realized her shift was long since over.

The rose was an afterthought; she hadn't remembered the tradition she had kept with herself until she had passed the shop on her way to the park.

It was silly, really. Lin was not sentimental in that way—the way of picking up flowers and losing track of the time and not being able to focus—but today had been harrowing in that she fully expected to grieve alone.

Not that she intended to "grieve," per se. You can't mourn what you never had.

_Not true_, a small voice inside Lin's head whispered. _Not true at all._

She _had_ mourned. Every single year, without fail.

Lin came to a stop beside a large oak tree. This was where it had all ended before it even had a chance to begin. Laying the rose down at the base of the tree, Lin raised the earth beneath it to make a pedestal of sorts. Simple. Nothing showy, nothing notable. Just earth and a flower. Nothing to imply attachment.

Somewhat lost, Lin looked around and, seeing no one, knelt carefully before the tree. The metal in her uniform groaned as she did so, but she paid it no mind. As the dark sky opened and rain began to fall, Lin's eyes slipped closed.

Unbidden, the memory she had suppressed all day surfaced and took hold of her as the water trickled down her face.

"_Let's go for a walk, Lin," said Tenzin, drawing her close to him as they walked away from the police headquarters. "Looks like a nice day for a stroll!"_

_It was not a nice day. The sky was an angry gray and the purple clouds threatened a harsh thunderstorm to come. Lin wanted to say as much, but Tenzin's arm was strong and insistent as it led her away._

_He had been very over-protective lately, ever since Lin started feeling ill a week or two ago. She had lost a fair bit of weight because of it. They phoned Katara, who said it was probably a combination of stress, overwork, and lack of proper nutrition, and Lin believed her. The green-eyed girl had refused an exam by the healer, knowing that it was nothing to be bothered about. She had accepted Katara's suspicions without any doubt in her mind. _

_Work had been almost unbearable lately, and it was starting to rattle her nerves. The triads were growing stronger and more violent with each passing day, and Lin had seen more bloodshed in the last month than she had the entire year prior._

_Tenzin knew as much, and was worried. He didn't think it was good for her to always be involved in the most gruesome of investigations and arrests. Lin often scoffed at his irrational but well-intentioned implications that she had a weak stomach and was suffering because of it. _

"_Where are you taking me?" Lin asked, pushing her thoughts aside and resisting a bit as Tenzin led her across the busy streets of Republic City. _

"_You'll see," said Tenzin distractedly as they arrived at the park. Everyone around them was rushing to get home before the storm arrived, but Tenzin paid them no mind. _

_Lin snorted at his secrecy, not amused by his ambiguous words._

_Finally, they arrived at a great big oak set far back into the heart of the park's thickest trees, with a blanket laid beneath it and a well-placed tarp tied among the branches to keep the impending rain away. There appeared to be a picnic basket set at the base of the oak, and Lin looked up at the airbender, smiling one of her rare smiles. _

"_Happy Anniversary, Lin," Tenzin said, releasing the grip he had on her arm just to reach up to her neck and lean in to kiss her. Lin returned the kiss, laughing as it began to rain._

"_Come on under the tarp. I think you'll find it's quite dry and warm under there," he said, taking her hand and sitting with her comfortably on the blanket. _

"_I didn't expect there to be a storm when I made the plans, but I decided a little picnic in the rain wouldn't be too bad, right?" Tenzin said as he unpacked the basket, placing the food next to Lin on the blanket. _

_Grinning widely, Lin said, "I love the rain. I wouldn't have it any other way."_

_It was a pleasant meal. The two benders talked about everything and nothing, laughing and smiling as people in love often do. Tenzin had packed Lin an extra set of clothes so that she could change out of her metal uniform, and things were winding down nicely as the rain picked up speed and intensity around them. Happy to be dry and comfortable in her loose-fitting civilian clothes, Lin propped herself against the trunk of the tree, wrapped in Tenzin's arms, watching the rain fall outside their tarp. _

"_You didn't eat much, love. Are you feeling all right?" Tenzin said, running his hand through the tangles in her hair._

"_Just a little queasy. Whatever bug I have is very persistent."_

"_You should let my mother take a look at you, Lin. What if it's something serious?" The worry in Tenzin's voice was almost enough to make Lin agree, but she was very much opposed to having Katara fuss over her. After a bit of inner struggling, Lin finally conceded. _

"_Tomorrow, okay? I'll go to her tomorrow. Tonight I just want to be with you," Lin said, nuzzling Tenzin's nose with her own._

_For a while they sat in silence, content to just be in one another's arms. Then Tenzin got an idea._

"_Lin?" _

"_Yes?"_

"_Let's dance." Tenzin had a boyish grin on his face, and Lin knew there would be no arguing, though she did her best._

"_What? Why? There's no music." _

_But Lin was already being lifted to her feet. Sighing, she moved the picnic basket out of the way so that they would have more room. They began with a slow waltz, then moved into a more frivolous tango and foxtrot. Tenzin playfully pulled them out from under the protection of the tarp, swinging Lin into the rain before he followed her in step. _

_Lin laughed, the rain quickly soaking into her clothes. Tenzin was in a similar state with his robes, but he didn't care. All that mattered was the laughing woman that he held in his arms as they danced in and out of the trees. _

_Tenzin was just swinging Lin out and then back into his embrace once more when he realized something was not quite right. Lin's face had drained of all color, and she looked to be in pain._

_Lin attempted to continue the dance, but stopped short with a sharp cry as her hand slipped from his and clutched her abdomen, pressing her hands into the area that pained her so acutely she could swear her very organs were being ripped out of her. _

"_Lin! What—"_

_Lin let out a piercing scream as she slipped from his arms entirely and fell to the ground before Tenzin could catch her. Immediately, Tenzin was on the ground beside her, trying to bring her back under the protection of the tarp and out of the pouring rain so that they could properly discuss what was wrong._

_But just the single act of picking up the earthbender gave Tenzin the greatest shock of his life, for when he reached beneath her, he felt his hands slip not on rain, but on blood. _

* * *

Lin cringed at the memory, pressing her palms against her closed eyes to try to rid herself of the images playing in her head.

She hadn't known that there was a life growing inside of her. There was no heartbeat—she could swear that she had never felt one, even when she started to feel ill. She had not planned on having children, did not particularly want to start a family—especially not at that time in her life. She was only a few years into being the chief of police, at that point. She wasn't ready, though she knew all that Tenzin wanted was just that—a family.

Katara—once over her initial shock—had assured her that miscarriages happen, that it was not unusual for someone who was frequently in a high-stress environment to miscarry during the first trimester. The healer reckoned that she had been about six weeks along, and wondered why Lin had not come to her sooner.

Quietly, Lin had explained that she had not known. She could usually tell long before others when there was a new life around, but there had never been a single heartbeat inside of her to be felt. Katara figured that her body was under too much stress for the embryo to develop properly. Lin was beside herself, unable to wrap her head around the prospect of what had been and what was now gone. She wasn't trying—wasn't expecting—wasn't_ thinking_ about such things. She had always been so careful to ensure that this would not happen. She had missed periods before with no reason to believe she was pregnant. She hadn't thought that this time was any different.

Opening her eyes and removing her hands, Lin was surprised to feel the rain lightening to a drizzle. The white flower before her was wet with rain drops, and she picked it up to lightly shake some of the water off of it before replacing it.

"May I join you?"

Lin hadn't heard him arrive. Quickly turning her head, Lin's eyes met Tenzin's, and she nodded silently.

Tenzin had brought a rose of his own; a red one. He placed it gently beside the white before kneeling to the left of the metalbender.

"I didn't—" Lin stopped, hearing the frailty in her voice and making a mental note to harden its sound before continuing, "I hadn't expected you to come."

Tenzin nodded. "I wasn't sure if you wanted me to come."

It was Lin's turn to nod.

Silence stretched between them, and Tenzin hated it. Hated that he could not break it for fear of breaking the delicate pieces of civility they had only just begun to collect.

Tenzin was shocked when it was Lin who spoke first.

"Jinora's a nice name, but I don't think that's what I would have called her—him—whatever it was."

Lin was lost in her thoughts. Tenzin did not know what to say to that, mostly because he had never heard Lin speak of the child that could have been in any terms other than she had not intended it to "be" in the first place.

Not quite finished, Lin continued, "I'm happy for you, though. You two can give it a proper home. Spirits know I couldn't have."

Lin reached out to touch the two flowers, fingers lingering on the wet petals. Tenzin could not find words to say, and so hers were greeted with silence.

Quite suddenly, Lin stood up. Tenzin followed her movements, watching as her eyes lingered on the little earthen pedestal.

"For what it's worth," Lin said, finally turning to face Tenzin once more, "even though I didn't want children…"

Tenzin's eyes searched her own.

"I'm happy that you're a father. I know how much it meant to you…" she broke their gaze to take one last look at the two roses, red and white, an old, outdated symbol of unity she was certain Tenzin must have forgotten when he bought it, "…_means_ to you."

And with that, Lin left, and Tenzin was shocked to discover, after many minutes of standing alone beneath the old oak, that it had stopped raining.

There was no battle here. Only roses and fallen rain.


	29. Addiction

A/N: I have to admit that I loved writing this chapter. It is very rare that I write about these things, and I had a jolly good time creating such an elaborate metaphor for the word "addiction." Special thanks go out to _Oh Dee_ for the inspiration to write about Tenzin's less-than-monk-like habits (go read _Pillars_) and to _satomobile_ for the inspiration to write about Tenzin and Lin's more physical relationship and the fact that they simply cannot ignore that they were so heavily involved with one another (go read _Gone, Not Forgotten_). Please let me know what you think! Reviews are what keep me writing.

* * *

Prelude: I am of the opinion that love is a stimulant, depressant, hallucinogen, and narcotic all encompassed in one delightfully deadly package of romance and desire.

* * *

_**Addiction**_

Tenzin is no fool. He knows he's hooked the first time he kisses her.

He is a young addict—eighteen when it starts—but most certainly not a foolish one. He swears he will stop between clandestine meetings and stolen kisses. He promises he will quit her, just as soon as her laughter stops forcing itself into his veins and coursing through his body like a drug. He promises he will wean himself off the adrenaline rush that accompanies every touch, every smile, every kiss. He rides the high like a current of wind—never wants to touch the ground again—but knows the familiar sinking feeling of the crash when she leaves him every morning long before the sun shines its disapproving rays upon them.

His addiction flourishes in the darkness, in the shadows, in the late hours of the night when nothing is expected of him.

After all, daylight requires a dedication to ancient air nomad ideals that do not include the temptation of pleasurable company. His father approves of their love, but Tenzin does not know if he should test his mother's patience. She would not like the idea of her youngest child engaging in such activities before marriage.

So they meet in secret, finding time between Lin's police shifts to be together at her apartment. Night after night, he drinks her beauty in like alcohol, eases his pain with the morphine in her mouth. They do not discuss this; she is too proud to admit that they have acquired a dependence on one another, a need that cannot be sated until they meet again.

Bumi mentions the peculiar addiction once, when he realizes that both are in far too deep to recover without a great deal of pain. Kya attempts to explain to them the dangers of using each other as a means of escaping the pressure of their responsibilities. Both hear, but neither listen.

There is no intervention.

When Katara finally does discover what is going on, Aang convinces her that they are young and in love and she needn't worry. They have plenty of years ahead to be engaged and get married, he says, but only a few years left to be so young and passionate. Katara does not approve, but remains quiet whenever she invites Lin to dinner and sees the way the two cannot look away from one another. She can only hope that the addiction does not kill them both, what with the danger involved in Lin's work and the propensity Tenzin has for getting himself far too involved in the political maelstrom that is Republic City's council. One wrong move, one accident, would mean the end for them both—physically, socially, mentally, or in varying degrees of all three—and it had become abundantly clear in the years that followed that neither could live without the other.

Addiction favors company. Rehab was not an option; neither wanted to be rid of the other.

That is, until Tenzin's focus shifted and Lin's position did not. The arrangement became laced with a different kind of poison, one that wasn't just a heavy cocktail of love and lust. Passion was diluted by a tolerance so heavy that it begged something more to achieve the same effect.

Lin was no lightweight. After years and years of suffering the same addiction, her tolerance was high, but not so high as to seek other methods of achieving the level of intoxication necessary to forget.

When the relationship begins to crumble, she notices the signs immediately.

She sees that Tenzin had found another high, one that would give him_ exactly_ what he wanted. He switched his prescription, tried to cut Lin cold-turkey when a compromise could not be reached after nearly twenty years of discussion. Lin could feel the sharp, icy grip of betrayal squeezing the tainted blood from her heart. But she could not bleed out the blood that bore his name; leeches were no help and she would not survive the pain of a transfusion.

Withdrawal symptoms started the moment Tenzin accepted Pema's confession of love. The shaking in his limbs was nothing compared to the phantom pains that racked his frame. It would appear that he was not fit for recovery. He should not have expected to trade love for a legacy and not suffer the consequences of stopping something that had become as necessary to him as breathing.

It felt like suffocation.

Like drowning.

It was neither romantic nor poetic when he realized that he could not control the very air he breathed.

_That's what love does_, he thinks. _Makes you lose the control you need to survive._

Lin's withdrawal is no less intense, but she does not have the luxury of another's company to help her through the pain. She entertains alcohol as a substitute for some time, but when Bumi finds her drowning her sorrows in the corner of a shady bar the night of Tenzin's engagement party, he smacks some sense into her.

It is in that moment that Lin realizes that she cannot afford another addiction. She had never been comfortable with dependency—there were never many things in her life that were constant enough to rely upon—and so she cut herself free from the strings that had tangled in the feathers of her old wings and wondered if she still remembered how to fly.

She didn't need his high to _soar_.


End file.
